Are lay-offs on the cards at Twitter?

Within days of Jack Dorsey taking over Twitter's command as permanent CEO, come some sombre news. The company is reportedly preparing to hand out pink slips across the board.

The social networking giant is planning company-wide layoffs next week. It is unclear how much of the staff will be culled, but Re/code reported insiders saying it would likely affect most of the departments.

The downsizing comes at the same time Twitter is restructuring its engineering organisation to make it leaner and more efficient.

Probability is high that many of those in the line of fire could be engineers, who make up about half the staff.

The reorganisation seems to be in line with what Dorsey has been preaching for the last four months - that Twitter needs to be more focused.

Twitter had roughly 4,000 employees last quarter, more than double the roughly 2,000 employees it had in the second quarter of 2013 just before the initial public offering (IPO).

There has been a feeling of late in close quarters that Twitter's engineering team is much larger than it needs to be.