Photo credit: Vaping360.com

 Juul, the e-cigarette maker, is planning to lay off more than half of its employees, according to recent reports coming from several sources. The e-cigarette maker, which already cut one-third of its workforce earlier this year, is planning to lay off over 50% of its employees and is also considering halting its sales across Europe and Asia, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal. Juul is said to be looking to slash its employee count from a current 2,200 to about 1,000.

Juul is facing dwindling sales amid mounting blames for a surge in teen vaping across the US. Once a high-flying startup bolstered by a nearly $13 billion investment from tobacco giant Altria, Juul has seen product sales dwindle as it faces pushback and increasing restrictions from regulators. It’s such that Altria, after investing $12.8 billion for a 35% stake in Juul, earlier this year wrote down its investment to the tune of $4.1 billion. As of January this year, there had been an 80% increase in the number of legal cases pending against Juul. The company even went as far as moving its headquarters from San Francisco to Washington, D.C, presumably to better tend to regulatory battles.

A statement from a Juul spokesperson said that no final decisions had been made regarding the reported layoffs.