Trend Micro's enterprise unit shuts Sydney engineering team

Security vendor TrendAI, which rebranded its enterprise unit from Trend Micro in March this year, will wind down its research and development function in Sydney, affecting 45 positions

Sources with knowledge of the restructure told iTnews that the redundancies comprise the enterprise security vendor's Australian engineering team, with their final day of work being June 30.

Engineering functions will be handled from the vendor's large Taipei office after June.

It's understood the vendor is presently hiring for roles in Taipei.

The closure of the engineering team came as a surprise to TrendAI Sydney R&D employees who were informed of the decision on Thursday last week.

"We knew something like this might come, but never heard anything official," a source told iTnews.

"We thought it might affect like 50 percent of [engineering] staff, but not 100 percent like this."

The loss of the R&D function is not due to artificial intelligence or the current economic crisis, but "business optimisation", the TrendAI source said.

iTnews sought confirmation from TrendAI on the job losses and the reasons for them, the June date, and whether or not the Sydney office would be retained.

"TrendAI is aligning its R&D capabilities to support our next phase of growth and ensure long-term sustainability," a TrendAI spokesperson said.

"R&D functions will now be centred around several global locations across North America and Asia, which has meant consolidation of other R&D locations including Australia.

"We recognise the impact this has on our employees and are committed to supporting them through this transition."

The spokesperson said that functions such as sales engineering and customer service "remain across the A/NZ region."

Tokyo-listed Trend Micro reported a modest 1.2 per cent net sales growth for the financial year ending December 31, 2025, compared to the year before, reaching $2.42 billion.

At the same time, aggressive cost discipline that included headcount reductions pushed operating profit margin to 20.9 percent, with operating income moving up by over one-fifth to $507 million for 2025. 

Trend Micro did not break out financial data for its Australian subsidiary, but its Asia-Pacific division made $627 million in 2025 sales.