Flock Safety, the troubled surveillance technology company, on Friday announced “generous” severance packages for employees who voluntarily leave the company, Wired reports.
According to reports, Flock expects a significant portion of its 1,500 employees to be interested in the deal and said it will approve the deal for a majority of interested employees. The company’s internal announcement said these packages are the “most generous” it has ever offered.
By letting employees voluntarily resign, Flock can say goodbye to team members who have been demoralized by continued backlash against the company’s license plate recognition technology. Wired also reported that without an acquisition, the company will “almost certainly” have to lay off some staff.
In August, the Washington Post identified 46 cases in which police officers were accused of abusing the flocking technique, including cases in which police officers allegedly stalked wives, girlfriends, or ex-lovers. Florida and Texas have both announced they intend to stop using the startup’s technology, and anti-surveillance groups have identified 90 cities that abolished frocks in August alone, a fourfold increase from the previous month.
TechCrunch has reached out to Flock for comment. The company’s CEO Garrett Langley recently said on the All In podcast that the “biggest damage” caused by the backlash was to “morale within the company.”
