ICYMI: Microsoft cuts 10,000 jobs

To those who missed it, Microsoft is the latest tech company that announced a mass layoff affecting 10,000 workers.

Photo from Microsoft

10k Microsoft employees to lose jobs

According to a report by CNN last week, the cutting of 10,000 jobs by Microsoft is part of its broader cost-cutting measures amid economic uncertainty.

Speaking before the announcement at the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland on Wednesday, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said that "No one can defy gravity and gravity here is inflation-adjusted economic growth."

In an earlier memo addressed to his staff, Nadella also noted the changing demand for digital services during the pandemic as well as looming recession fears.

We're living through times of significant change, and as I meet with customers and partners, a few things are clear, he wrote. First, as we saw customers accelerate their digital spend during the pandemic, we're now seeing them optimize their digital spend to do more with less.

Nadella said the job cuts represent less than 5 percent of the company's total workforce.

This is expected to be completed by the end of its fiscal third quarter this year, which ends in March.

Nadella noted the company will incur a USD 1.2 billion charge (or around PHP 65.34 billion) in its second quarter related to "severance costs, changes to our hardware portfolio, and the cost of lease consolidation."

These decisions are difficult, but necessary, Nadella wrote.

The tech company had around 221,000 full-time employees globally as of June 30, 2022, according to a US Securities and Exchange Commission filing. Of this number, around 122,000 are US-based.

Prior to Microsoft, other tech companies had announced major job cuts in their workforces since the start of the year. This is because inflation weighs on consumer spending and rising interest rates squeeze funding.

The demand for digital services during the pandemic has also declined as people return to the pre-pandemic way of life.

For one, Amazon announced that it plans to lay off 18,000 people, while Facebook parent Meta also recently announced 11,000 job cuts, the largest in the company's history.

In October, Axios reported that Microsoft had laid off under 1,000 employees across several divisions.

Some tech CEOs have blamed themselves for over-hiring early on in the pandemic and misreading how a surge in demand for their products would cool once health restrictions eased.

Another major layoff from a big tech company. Tell us what you think about this.

Source: CNN