The latest round of terminations, which will take effect Sept. 15, comes after Genentech fired more than 500 employees in the last 15 months.
Genentech is letting go of 87 employees at its South San Francisco headquarters, the second round of layoffs at the Roche subsidiary in as many months.
The workforce reduction, announced in a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act notice that was processed last week, will take effect Sept. 15. BioSpace has reached out to the company for further comment.
Genentech had trimmed its headcount just last month, parting ways with 143 employees who were working at its headquarters. “Periodically, adjustments and decisions are necessary regarding the right makeup of our workforce within our company’s various functions,” a spokesperson told BioSpace at the time, saying that such staffing shifts are needed to ensure that the company can better address patient needs and deliver novel medicines. Those layoffs took effect July 14.
For more than a year, the Roche unit has been shifting its priorities. In April 2024, for instance, Genentech downsized by 3%, with layoffs affecting some 400 employees across multiple departments. Days later, the company walked away from a $3 billion agreement with Adaptimmune, signed in 2021, to collaborate on allogeneic T cell therapies.
Later that year, in August 2024, Genentech rearranged its oncology operations, shutting down its cancer immunology unit and bringing its R&D efforts in that space under the fold of its molecular oncology program. A company spokesperson said at the time that “shifts in the science of immuno-oncology” drove the decision. That same month, Genentech terminated 93 employees at its South San Francisco office.
Genentech and its parent Roche have not given up on cancer, however. In May 2025, the pharma deepened its ongoing molecular glue relationship Orionis Biosciences, putting more than $2 billion on the line. The partnership, which originated in 2023 for $47 million upfront, will focus on developing novel small-molecule glues for “novel and challenging” cancer targets, according to a May 21 news release.
Aside from the Orionis deal, Roche this year also signed a potential $1 billion contract with Innovent, gaining access to the Chinese biotech’s anti-DLL3 antibody-drug conjugate IBI3009, being developed for small-cell lung cancer and other neuroendocrine tumors. The pharma has also made hefty investments beyond cancer, including a $5.3 billion bet with Zealand Pharma for its weight-loss therapy, the amylin analog petrelintide.
Meanwhile, as Genentech continues to trim its San Francisco workforce, the company in May announced a $700 million manufacturing pledge in North Carolina, earmarked for the construction of a production plant for its next-generation obesity assets. Once operational, Genentech said the site will add 400 manufacturing jobs in the area, while construction activities create some 1,500 openings.
