Microsoft is offering voluntary buyouts to about 60,000 employees, roughly a quarter of its workforce, as the company cuts costs while pouring money into artificial intelligence, Dawn and Geo News reported.
The company confirmed the offer on Monday. It had 223,000 employees worldwide at the end of June.
Who can take it
- Where: staff on selected teams in the United States, Canada, India and Britain.
- Who: employees at vice president level and below.
- Included: some AI, Copilot, finance, human resources, Xbox and Windows teams, Geo News reported.
- Excluded: some groups, including some working on data centres, sales, marketing, commercial business and security.
- When: employees must decide in early December, and those who accept will leave on December 31, Geo News reported.
“The Voluntary Exit Offer reflects an important part of how we’re evolving our approach to change: creating greater flexibility and, where possible, more ways for employees to shape their next chapter,” Chief People Officer Amy Coleman told staff in a memo.
The second offer this year
In April, Microsoft offered about 7pc of its US workforce the option to retire early, and around 30pc of those eligible took it, according to CNBC. In July, it cut nearly 5,000 jobs, many in its Xbox gaming division.
The new offer reaches higher than April’s, up to vice president level, though the company says it has no specific target for how many people should accept. Microsoft’s shares rose 1pc on Monday.
Microsoft reported cash flow of $19.64bn for its latest quarter, down 23pc from a year earlier, Geo News reported.
Big tech’s spending race
Microsoft expects to spend about $175bn in 2026, mostly on data centres and chips, down from an earlier forecast of $190bn. It said in July that it had spent $41bn between April and June and expected to spend $50bn between July and September. Around two-thirds goes on short-lived assets, mainly chips, Chief Financial Officer Amy Hood said. Amazon, Microsoft, Alphabet and Meta together are on track to spend roughly $700bn on AI infrastructure this year.
Other tech firms are also cutting jobs. Meta laid off about 10pc of its staff, around 8,000 people, in May. Uber said in September it would cut about 10pc of its workforce, and eBay laid off 1,000 employees this month. Netflix will reportedly cut about 6pc of its workforce, or 1,000 jobs.
Background: AI and jobs
The cuts feed a wider debate about what AI will do to work. Even industry insiders, such as Anthropic chief executive Dario Amodei, have warned of mass job losses. Earlier this month, Microsoft and Indian IT firms were also hit when the US froze their green-card filings.
Why it matters for Pakistan
India is one of the four countries where staff can take the offer, a reminder that tech cuts now reach South Asia’s outsourcing and engineering hubs, not just Silicon Valley. For Pakistani IT graduates and freelancers, the trend points to tougher competition for jobs at global tech firms and greater demand for AI skills.
What to watch: how many employees accept by December, and whether Microsoft follows with compulsory layoffs if take-up is low.
This article draws on reporting by Dawn and Geo News.
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