Microsoft laying off about 9,000 employees in latest round of cuts

Microsoft said Wednesday that it volition laic disconnected astir 9,000 employees. The determination volition impact little than 4% of its planetary workforce crossed antithetic teams, geographies and levels of experience, a idiosyncratic acquainted with the substance told CNBC.

The announcement comes connected the 2nd time of Microsoft's 2026 fiscal year. Executives astatine the Redmond, Washington-based institution typically unveil reorganizations astatine the clip of the caller fiscal year.

"We proceed to instrumentality organizational changes indispensable to champion presumption the institution and teams for occurrence successful a dynamic marketplace," a Microsoft spokesperson said successful an email.

Microsoft has held respective rounds of layoffs already this calendar year. In January, it chopped less than 1% of headcount based connected performance. The 50-year-old bundle institution slashed much than 6,000 jobs successful May and past astatine slightest 300 much successful June. As of June 2024 it employed 228,000 people. In 2023, it laid disconnected 10,000.

Perhaps the largest culling of Microsoft workers came successful 2014, erstwhile the institution eliminated 18,000 aft acquiring Nokia's devices and services business.

As was the lawsuit with the May layoffs, Microsoft is looking to trim the fig of layers of managers that basal betwixt idiosyncratic contributors and apical executives, said the idiosyncratic who asked not to beryllium named portion discussing interior matters.

"To presumption Gaming for enduring occurrence and let america to focus on strategic maturation areas, we volition extremity oregon alteration enactment successful definite areas of the concern and travel Microsoft's pb successful removing layers of absorption to summation agility and effectiveness," Phil Spencer, Microsoft's CEO of gaming, wrote successful a Wednesday memo to employees successful that division.

Microsoft reported astir $26 cardinal successful nett income connected $70 cardinal successful gross for the March quarter. The numbers were well ahead of Wall Street's consensus, keeping Microsoft ranked arsenic 1 of the astir profitable companies successful the S&P 500 index, according to information compiled by FactSet.

Executives called for astir 14% year-over-year gross maturation successful the June quarter, acknowledgment to expected enlargement successful Azure unreality services and firm productivity bundle subscriptions.

Microsoft banal closed astatine a grounds precocious of $497.45 per stock connected June 26. It closed down 0.2% connected Wednesday, portion the S&P 500 gained 0.5%.

Autodesk, Chegg and CrowdStrike are among the other bundle providers that person slimmed down successful 2025. Earlier connected Wednesday, payroll processing institution ADP said the U.S. backstage assemblage lost 33,000 jobs successful June. Economists polled by Dow Jones had predicted an summation of 100,000.