The cuts will impact under 4% of the tech giant’s workforce, a spokesperson for the tech giant told PYMNTS Wednesday (July 2).
“We continue to implement organizational changes necessary to best position the company and teams for success in a dynamic marketplace,” the spokesperson said.
While the company would not comment on the exact number of jobs involved, Microsoft in mid-2024 employed 228,000 people. Based on that figure and subtracting the other cuts the company has made this year, a 4% reduction would impact nearly 8,800 jobs.
The company added that it has routinely “adjusted” its workforce to meet strategic demands “even in the best of times.”
The cuts are designed to increase agility by reducing management layers, with Microsoft saying it would “empower employees to spend more time focusing on meaningful work by leveraging new technologies and capabilities.”
These cuts follow a 1% performance-based reduction in January, plus 6,000 cuts in May and another 300 or so in June.
A report on the layoffs by CNBC included a memo sent by Phil Spencer, Microsoft’s CEO of gaming, to employees of that division Wednesday.
“To position Gaming for enduring success and allow us to focus on strategic growth areas, we will end or decrease work in certain areas of the business and follow Microsoft’s lead in removing layers of management to increase agility and effectiveness,” Spencer wrote.
The news comes amid reports of cuts at several other high-profile companies. A report last month from Seeking Alpha citing WARNTracker.com, a website that tracks layoffs, noted that JPMorgan Chase, Morgan Stanley and Wells Fargo were all planning cuts.
Walmart, meanwhile, announced in May it was planning to cut roughly 1,500 jobs across its eCommerce, fulfillment and tech divisions as part of a larger restructuring.
In other Microsoft news, the company earlier this week announced that its Microsoft AI Diagnostic Orchestrator (MAI-DxO) was able to correctly diagnose 85% of diagnostically complex cases published by the New England Journal of Medicine, versus a mean accuracy of 20% among the physicians included in a study.
MAI-DxO also achieved correct diagnoses more cost effectively than the doctors, the company wrote on its blog.
“For AI to make a difference, clinicians and patients alike must be able to trust its performance,” the post said. “That’s where our new benchmarks and AI orchestrator come in.”
