China’s trade war with the US and slowing economic growth is hitting its tech industry hard. China’s tech industry is feeling the effects of the trade war with the US as thousands of workers lose their jobs.

The once-booming startup industry has diminished in size over recent weeks as investment funds shrink and market conditions tighten. Analysts say a positive trade deal with the US would provide China’s jobs market with a much-needed boost, but the damage has already been done.

Mr. Ouyang Zeling is one of the many who recently lost their jobs.  The 27 year-old was thrilled to be hired by one of China’s leading bike-sharing companies in early 2018 but just got laid off before Chinese New Year this year.  "Every few days I heard news about layoffs, I started to panic ...I thought they might layoff people soon, but I didn’t expect it to happen so fast," said Ouyang.

Dozens of startups as well as established internet giants, including ‘China’s Uber’ Didi Chuxing and ecommerce platform JD.com have been cutting staff.

Since this downturn is one of the most significant economic challenges China has faced in recent years, many workers are unprepared and panic when they have to deal with the impact of being laid off.

“Many people are unprepared.  They don’t know what rights they have within the context of labor law and they don’t know how to deal with friends, family and peers after they’ve lost their jobs.  Psychological support and advices are vital to them during this difficult period,” said Howard Lee, founder and CEO of Lucas GC Limited.

The mobile app Layoff Pal, developed by a China-based startup called Lucas GC Limited, has become handy for these people.   Through the app they can network with peers in the industry in order to quickly identify new job opportunities.  In addition, they can find useful information such as legal advices on labor law and psychological advices on how to deal with the impact of being laid off.

Layoff Pal also operates a mobile social network called Columbus that has over 1 million users who are mostly mid to senior level white collar workers with over five years of work experience.

“Our AI-enabled network with proprietary algorithm vastly improves the efficiency of finding the right job opportunities that match these people’s backgrounds and skill sets.  They can connect directly with the industry peers who can help them land the next job quickly.  We’ve been able to help people find a new job within one month, whereas on average it takes 3-6 months for people to secure a new job through traditional ways,” Lee said.

“Users can also efficiently find industry news and obtain personalized content feed based on their interests and behaviors through a machine learning-enabled algorithm so that they can stay abreast of the industry trends relevant to them.  They don’t have to browse tens of different websites to look for relevant information- it’s a one-stop news feed for these people.  Since most of the 1 million users of the social network Columbus are experienced executives, augmented with Big Data matching technology,  it’s very efficient for people to connect and network with industry peers to quickly find new job opportunities.  It’s quite remarkable and over hundreds of people have found new opportunities through the platform.  We’re glad to be able to help these people during this difficult period of time,” Lee said. Know more at www.lucasgchr.com .