Microsoft is offering buyouts to about 60,000 employees, roughly a quarter of its staff, Bloomberg reports. Chief people officer Amy Coleman introduces the Voluntary Exit Offer in a note to staff that Microsoft has also published as a blog post.
Coleman writes that the offer gives employees “who may be considering a future outside the company a new choice to make that transition now with support.” It’s voluntary and time-limited, and eligible employees get the details by email.
Her note limits it to participating teams in the US, Canada, India and the UK. It reaches up to vice president level, a Microsoft spokesperson tells Bloomberg, and takers get benefits similar to a standard severance package.
Xbox, Windows, Copilot and finance are fully participating, according to people familiar with the terms. Some staff who work on data centers, sales, marketing, cybersecurity and quantum computing can’t take it, they say, and Microsoft declines to comment on that list.
In some cases, Microsoft will still try to keep top talent who say yes, the spokesperson says. Flattering, if a little awkward.
The offer builds on the Voluntary Retirement Program from earlier this year, Coleman writes. More than 30% of the roughly 8,750 people eligible for that one took it. This one goes to nearly seven times as many people, but Microsoft expects far fewer to accept, according to the spokesperson.
Microsoft had 223,000 employees at the end of June, a number that has stayed largely flat since 2022. That’s about when it began spending heavily on AI and data centers, squeezing budgets and hiring elsewhere in the company.
Its financial results are due on Wednesday, October 28th, and investors will be looking for signs that all that AI spending is paying off. That’s a lot of people rereading one email very carefully this week.
