LAST UPDATE | 18 Jan 2023

MICROSOFT HAS SAID it will layoff 10,000 employees in the coming months, as the economic downturn continues to punish US tech giants.

The cuts were “in response to macroeconomic conditions and changing customer priorities,” the maker of the Windows operating system said in a US regulatory filing.

It is not yet known how many of the cuts will be made in the company’s Irish division. Microsoft employs 3,500 people in its Dublin office. When asked about potential Irish layoffs, an official spokesperson for the company said it would not be commenting and directed us to the official statement issued to staff today.

That post confirmed that 10,000 jobs would be lost as a result of what Microsoft described as “significant changes” in the global economy. You can read the full post here. 

Several media outlets reported this morning that the tech giant was planning significant cuts.

The Washington-based company, which industry trackers say has more than 220,000 workers worldwide, trimmed its ranks of employees twice last year.

The new layoff announcement comes a week before Microsoft is to report its earnings for the final three months of last year.

“Over the last few weeks we have seen significant headcount cut reduction from stalwarts Salesforce and Amazon,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said in a note to investors.

Wedbush is expecting staff cuts of another 5 to 10 percent across the tech sector, Ives told investors.

“Many of these companies were spending money like 1980′s Rock Stars and now need to reign in the expense controls ahead of a softer (macro-economic conditions),” Ives wrote.

Amazon announced in early January that it plans to cut more than 18,000 jobs from its workforce, citing “the uncertain economy” and the fact the online retail behemoth had “hired rapidly” during the pandemic.

The job-slashing plan is the largest among recent layoffs that have impacted the once-unassailable US tech sector, including at giants such as Facebook-owner Meta.

Some of the Amazon layoffs would be in Europe, CEO Andy Jassy in a statement to staff, adding that the impacted workers would be informed starting today.

Major platforms with an advertising-based business model are facing budget cuts from advertisers, who are reducing expenses in the face of inflation.

Meta announced in November the loss of 11,000 jobs, or about 13 percent of its workforce. At the end of August, Snapchat let go about 20 percent of its employees, around 1,200 people.

And in early January, IT group Salesforce announced it was laying off around 10 percent of its employees, or just under 8,000 people

Twitter was bought in October by billionaire Elon Musk, who promptly fired about half of the social media platform’s 7,500 employees.

An unknown number more resigned in protest of his policy changes.

With reporting by © AFP 2023 and Garreth MacNamee