Microsoft is on course to announce a massive job cut, major news outlets have reported. The tech giant could lay off as many as 11,000 people across many divisions, the reports say.
The job cuts to be announced shortly would amount to 5 percent of the workforce of around 220,000 employees, Sky News reported.
Across Engineering Division
According to Bloomberg News, the job cuts would mostly affect a number of engineering divisions. It also says that the current round of job cuts will be significantly larger than earlier layoffs announced by Microsoft.
Microsoft has not responded to the reports. Reports said last October that Microsoft was laying off nearly 1,000 employees across multiple divisionsof the company.
Multiple laid-off workers turned to Twitter and Blind, among other online forums, to share that their job had been cut. "Like all companies, we evaluate our business priorities on a regular basis, and make structural adjustments accordingly. We will continue to invest in our business and hire in key growth areas in the year ahead," Axios had cited a Microsoft statement as saying at that time.
Tech Sector Layoffs
In recent times, large tech behemoths like Amazon and Facebook owner Meta have announced huge job cuts.
"From a big picture perspective, another pending round of layoffs at Microsoft suggests the environment is not improving, and likely continues to worsen," analyst Dan Romanoff told reuters.
while Meta , said it was laying off 11,000 jobs, Amazon's job cuts is expected to reach 18,000 positions.
In October, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said the company was facing a stringent 'belt-tightening' as the macroeconomic conditions worsened. "We're focused on helping our customers do more with less, while investing in secular growth areas and managing our cost structure in a disciplined way," he said, according to Yahoo News.
The company was on a hiring spree in the last couple of years as it saw profits soaring in the pandemic years. According to reports Microsoft hired about 50,000 employees during that time.
