NEW YORK, Feb 7 (Reuters) - Facebook owner Meta

Platforms ( META ) plans to carry out its expected company-wide

layoffs next week while pushing ahead with the expedited hiring

of machine learning engineers, it told staffers in internal

memos seen by Reuters on Friday.

Notices will go out to employees losing their jobs starting

at 5 a.m. local time Monday in most countries, including in the

U.S., according to one of the posts, authored by Meta's Head of

People Janelle Gale.

Employees in Germany, France, Italy and the Netherlands will

be exempt from the cuts "due to local regulations," while those

in more than a dozen other countries across Europe, Asia and

Africa will receive their notifications between February 11 and

February 18, it said.

A Meta spokesperson declined to comment on the posts.

The company confirmed last month that it was planning to

trim about 5% of its "lowest performers" and backfill at least

some of the positions. The Friday memo, in which Gale referred

to the cuts as "performance terminations," was first reported by

The Information.

Unlike with previous company-wide layoffs, Meta was planning

to keep its offices open on Monday and would not issue any

updates providing further details on the decisions, Gale said in

her post.

A separate memo, posted by VP of Engineering for

Monetization Peng Fan also on Friday, asked staffers to assist

with an expedited hiring process for machine learning engineers

and other "business critical" engineering roles.

That process would take place between February 11 and March

13, Fan said in that post.

"Thank you for your continued support in helping us achieve

our accelerated hiring goals, and better align with our

company's priorities for 2025."