Michael Speier, Executive Editor of Variety, has been laid off. More cuts are expected to come at Variety throughout the day. The parent company of the publication, Reed Business Information, is laying off 7% of their staff today according to a memo obtained by The Wrap. From the memo sent by Tad Smith, CEO of RBI:

We recently completed our quarterly forecast for the full year and the revenue outlook continues to concern us. On January 26th I wrote to you that we might reduce further our staffing levels if the economic circumstances became worse than our already conservative expectations for 2009. We are in that unfortunate situation today.

Smith also warns staff that more cuts and furloughs may be on the horizon.