Google fires 20 more employees over protest against Project Nimbus contract

Google's employees staged protests against the company's collaboration with the Israeli government on "Project Nimbus", a $1.2 billion cloud computing initiative

Following the termination of 28 employees last week due to sit-in protests at Google's offices in New York and California, the company fired over 20 additional employees, according to a report in the Hindustan Times (HT).

The employees staged protests against Google's collaboration with the Israeli government on "Project Nimbus", a $1.2 billion cloud computing initiative.

The HT reported that nine protesters were arrested by the police after they occupied Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian's office for over eight hours. The sit-ins in New York and California's Sunnyvale were led by "No Tech For Apartheid", which has been organising Google employees against Project Nimbus since 2021.

Google confirmed more firings after continuing investigations into the April 16 "sit-ins," which disrupted operations. A spokesperson said each fired worker had "actively disrupted offices".

According to the HT report, following the arrest of nine employees, Google's head of security, Chris Rackow, sent a memo condemning the demonstrations. He said, "Behavior like this has no place in our workplace and we will not tolerate it. It clearly violates multiple policies that all employees must adhere to — including our Code of Conduct and policy on harassment, discrimination, retaliation, standards of conduct, and workplace concerns."

Rackow further said the company investigated the incident and terminated the employment of 28 employees. "If you're one of the few tempted to think we're going to overlook conduct that violates our policies, think again," he added,

Google CEO Sundar Pichai warns employees

Sundar Pichai, the chief executive officer (CEO) of Google, warned employees that while the company fosters an open culture promoting debate and discussion, there are boundaries to adhere to, the HT report stated.

Pichai said, "We have a culture of vibrant, open discussion that enables us to create amazing products and turn great ideas into action. That's important to preserve. But ultimately we are a workplace and our policies and expectations are clear: this is a business, and not a place to act in a way that disrupts coworkers or makes them feel unsafe, to attempt to use the company as a personal platform, or to fight over disruptive issues or debate politics. This is too important a moment as a company for us to be distracted."

Project Nimbus

Project Nimbus, a joint contract between Google and Amazon signed in 2021, seeks to deliver cloud computing infrastructure, artificial intelligence (AI), and various other technological services to the Israeli government and its military.