Technology stocks have had a great year so far. Tech employees, not so much. A new round of layoffs at
Microsoft
shows the threat of job cuts continues to loom over the sector.
Microsoft
(ticker: MSFT) is cutting at least 276 jobs, according to a local government filing in Washington. The layoffs are largely in customer service, support, and sales according to technology-news website GeekWire, which first reported the cuts—and appear to be on top of the 10,000 jobs which Microsoft said it would cut earlier this year.
Microsoft declined to comment on the total number of jobs cut.
“Organizational and workforce adjustments are a necessary and regular part of managing our business. We will continue to prioritize and invest in strategic growth areas for our future and in support of our customers and partners,” said a Microsoft spokesperson in an emailed comment.
Microsoft shares were down 0.4% in early trading Monday.
While the pace of tech job cuts might have slowed down since the series of mass layoff announcements early in 2023, the reductions keep coming. Videogame maker Niantic, the developer of Pokémon Go, said in late June that it would cut around 230 staff, or 25% of its workforce.
More than 216,000 tech employees have been laid off this year so far according to Layoffs.fyi, a website that tracks planned layoffs in media reports and company releases. Its tracker shows the number of job cuts announced has steadily declined each month from a peak of more than 89,000 in January to 10,524 in June.
Microsoft isn’t the only big tech company still making cuts. Google-parent
Alphabet
(GOOG) recently confirmed to CNBC it was eliminating advertising jobs in its Waze mapping service.
Alphabet
outlined plans to cut 12,000 workers in January.
Write to Adam Clark at [email protected]
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