Airtable's post-acquisition layoffs put vendor risk in focus

Airtable's new owner is laying off a "large part" of the company's pre-acquisition workforce, just weeks after promising to invest heavily in the relational database management platform's product and customer support.

Bending Spoons, an Italian technology conglomerate, completed its $1.28 billion acquisition of Airtable on Sept. 4. On Monday, Airtable's new product lead, Alessandro Savarese, announced that affected employees would leave by the end of the week. He described the move as a shift toward smaller teams with clearer responsibilities, saying experienced engineers, product managers and designers from across Bending Spoons had already joined Airtable.

Savarese also assured customers that their plans, prices and service offerings would remain unchanged, the customer-facing organization had not been affected, and Airtable would continue monthly platform improvements.

For customers, these are reassuring signs of continuity. Yet the longer-term implications of a change in ownership may take months to emerge. A product can continue receiving updates while the new owner changes how it is developed, supported and funded.

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Eva-Christie Bessala, director for pricing, procurement, contracts and commercial services at business consultancy The One Apart, said an acquisition should prompt CIOs to reassess whether a vendor remains aligned with their organization's needs — but that it's important not to overreact at the first sign of trouble.

"Just looking at workforce reduction is not a big sign of any specific strategy because it is not enough to make a commercial judgment," she said.

The question for enterprise customers is whether the commitments made during an acquisition will hold as the buyer's operating model takes shape.

Examine the new owner's intentions

A workforce reduction can affect a vendor's ability to develop and support its product, but the consequences depend on which functions are affected and how the buyer intends to run the business.

Carter Busse, CIO at Workato, an enterprise automation platform provider, recommended asking the new owner directly which teams were cut.

"If it's the people building the innovation, that would really concern me. If it's back-office overlap, that wouldn't concern me as much," he said.

He also advised that CIOs investigate the rationale behind the acquisition; a buyer looking to expand a product may continue investing in its development, while one more interested in the customer base or recurring revenue may have different priorities for the product's future.

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"That answer tells you a lot," Busse said.

The buyer's track record can also help CIOs assess what those intentions mean in practice. Bessala recommended examining how the buyer has handled previous acquisitions, including whether it continued investing in products, maintained customer support, consolidated overlapping offerings or restructured the businesses it bought.

These decisions can reveal how the owner balances operational efficiencies against the needs of existing customers. A history of consolidating products, for example, gives CIOs reason to ask whether their platform's features could eventually be folded into another offering or discontinued. On the other hand, previous investment in acquired products may offer grounds for confidence, although CIOs should verify whether the same approach is planned for the vendor they rely on.

They should also identify new executives and account contacts, then ask how responsibilities, product priorities and resources supporting existing services might change.

Measure what changes for customers

CIOs need ways to assess whether a vendor is delivering on its commitments. Beverly Weed-Schertzer, an executive consultant at IT consulting firm edifyIT, suggested looking for a funded roadmap with target dates, detailed release notes, advance notice of breaking changes and formal end-of-life procedures.

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"Broad assurances about the future without the ability to measure milestones is a red flag, indicating that the new owner isn't fully committed to a long-term partnership," she warned.

Product performance offers another measure of investment. CIOs should track critical bug-fix timelines, the value and cadence of releases, and whether promised improvements arrive as scheduled. Weed-Schertzer recommended comparing current performance with the previous six to 12 months to distinguish a meaningful decline from normal variation. That baseline can cover product quality, service performance and delivery against commitments.

For Bessala, routine interactions with the vendor can be as revealing of what a future partnership might look like, even if they seem insubstantial in the moment.

"The earliest warning signs are often seen when trying to escalate issues or when experiencing delays," Bessala said.

Still, it is important not to overreact prematurely. CIOs should establish whether these problems are isolated incidents or part of a wider pattern. A change in account management, for instance, may be routine after an acquisition; persistent difficulties getting critical issues resolved carry more direct implications for the business.

Determining when the evidence warrants action

A missed release date may have an isolated explanation. Repeated delays alongside declining service quality offer stronger evidence that a vendor is struggling to meet its commitments.

Busse said that as a proactive measure, he would contact the account team early and track performance for a quarter or two, rather than reacting to a single incident. His advice also provided CIOs with a practical threshold for deciding when to investigate alternatives:

"One signal on its own is worth watching. When you see two together, like slipping uptime and a missed roadmap date, that's when I'd start looking at alternatives," he said.

Some failures demand a faster response. Weed-Schertzer advised acting immediately when deterioration creates material security, compliance or business continuity risks. The discontinuation of a critical feature or service failures that threaten operations can also require urgent action, even before a longer-term performance trend becomes clear.

Another area for potential evidence is in the commercial terms . Bessala identified significant price increases and more restrictive renewal conditions as potential signs of a changing relationship, particularly when accompanied by weaker support or missed commitments.

All the experts agreed that establishing a baseline early on is key: CIOs should define acceptable service levels, essential product capabilities and escalation thresholds before a crisis. Regular reviews can then compare actual performance with contractual commitments and business needs, helping leaders decide when closer monitoring is sufficient and when alternatives need to be explored.

Preserve the option to leave

Preparing an alternative does not mean committing to a migration; it simply gives the organization room to respond if the relationship no longer meets its needs.

Busse advised reviewing price protections, data-export rights and termination terms, while maintaining regular backups. He also said that CIOs should map where the product is used across the business, which teams depend on it and what other systems connect to it. Those dependencies can make an eventual transition more complicated than expected if not methodically tracked.

For Bessala, the priority should be to check contractual provisions covering changes of control, service, termination, data handling and migration. Renewal periods can be particularly useful in these circumstances, offering an opportunity to negotiate clearer service commitments, price protections and notice requirements for significant product changes.

Organizations should also establish how long a migration would take, which alternatives are viable and what support would be needed to move data and workflows. These preparations are particularly important for deeply embedded platforms, where replacing the software may require changes to connected systems and established business processes.

As Bessala put it, "Having an exit strategy does not mean you will exit, it just means you are ready for the changes."

For CIOs, the aim is to retain that choice before deteriorating service, contractual constraints or complex dependencies make it harder to act.

A layoff announcement alone cannot establish whether a vendor will remain a reliable partner. The stronger basis for a decision is a clear understanding of the new owner's intentions, measurable performance over time and a credible route to another solution if the relationship changes.

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