Microsoft Said to Announce Job Cuts as Soon as This Week

Microsoft Corp. (MSFT) reportedly planned a significant round of layoffs, the most extensive in over five years, aiming to streamline operations and integrate Nokia Oyj’s handset unit, as per sources close to the development. Speculation indicated that the impending layoffs could be announced as early as the same week, specifically affecting Nokia and overlapping Microsoft departments, as well as marketing and engineering roles. This restructuring could surpass the 5,800 jobs lost in 2009, potentially becoming the software behemoth’s largest in-company history. Final details of the job cuts were being worked out.

This speculation followed a week after CEO Satya Nadella’s comprehensive mission statement, advocating an added emphasis on mobile devices, cloud computing, and productivity software. Nadella, who succeeded Steve Ballmer in February, promised a more streamlined and efficient Microsoft and was expected to offer more insights on the implementation plan later that month.

Since 2009, Microsoft conducted occasional minor job cuts within distinct departments. However, the company only once acted on a broad restructuring, impacting thousands of employees, during the recession onset when it eliminated about 5 percent of its workforce (5,800 jobs).

As of early June, the company employed over 127,000 people, a figure that surged by approximate 30,000 due to Nokia’s handset unit acquisition. Microsoft pledged at the acquisition time to save $600 million annually 18 months following the acquisition. To meet this commitment, job cuts in both companies’ overlapping areas were probable. Further layoffs could emerge due to Nadella’s restructuring of the engineering team, which aimed to revolutionize software-building through cloud methods, rendering software testers redundant.

Such a cost-reduction strategy wasn’t exclusive to Microsoft. Other tech juggernauts like Hewlett-Packard Co. have also adopted similar measures. CEO Meg Whitman declared plans to discard an additional 16,000 positions following a total of 34,000 previously eliminated jobs, after enduring 11 successive quarters of declining sales.

Meanwhile, rumors of potential job cuts coincided with talk of Microsoft participating in preliminary negotiations to acquire Israeli security firm Aorato, an Accel Partners-backed firewall software developer.

Light edits were made in 2025 to improve clarity and relevance.