AOL to lay off half of Patch sites’ workers

8/17/2013

NEW YORK — AOL Inc. is laying off up to half the work force at its Patch local news sites and close or consolidate roughly 150 of the 900 sites while looking for partners for others.

Up to 500 of Patch’s 1,000 employees will go in the layoffs, which started Friday with 350 people. In all, the layoffs amount to about 9 percent of AOL’s total work force of 5,500.