What you need to know
- Microsoft has cut 10,000 jobs across various divisions
- Over 60 jobs seem to be cut at 343 industries, the developer of Halo
- Bethesda Games Studios, the team behind Starfield, Fallout and The Elder Scrolls, also seems to be affected
Today Microsoft revealed they are cutting ten thousand jobs. It’s a massive round of layoffs across various divisions within Microsoft which will be completed on March 31st. The CEO of Microsoft, Satya Nadella, announced the layoffs today in a blogpost.
In the blog post he writes: ”We’re living through times of significant change, and as I meet with customers and partners, a few things are clear. First, as we saw customers accelerate their digital spend during the pandemic, we’re now seeing them optimize their digital spend to do more with less” and he continues ”First, we will align our cost structure with our revenue and where we see customer demand. Today, we are making changes that will result in the reduction of our overall workforce by 10,000 jobs through the end of FY23 Q3. This represents less than 5 percent of our total employee base, with some notifications happening today. It’s important to note that while we are eliminating roles in some areas, we will continue to hire in key strategic areas. We know this is a challenging time for each person impacted. The senior leadership team and I are committed that as we go through this process, we will do so in the most thoughtful and transparent way possible.”
The divisions hit hardest seem to be HoloLens, marketing and Microsoft Edge. But, also at Microsoft Gaming jobs are being cut. Currently most reports of layoffs are coming from 343 industries, the development studio behind Halo. According to a report by Lords of Gaming, over 60 jobs were cut at 343i today. This means more than 10% of the workforce at the studio got cut.
Another studio being hit by layoffs is Bethesda Games Studios. Various reports are coming in from people losing their jobs at the Starfield studio. It’s unclear if other Xbox Game Studios / Bethesda SoftWorks studios have been hit with layoffs today.
It’s the second largest round of layoffs ever in Microsoft history. Back in 2014 when current CEO Satya Nadella was promoted Microsoft cut 18,000 jobs, mostly from the Nokia division.
Not surprised about 343/Infinite, especially if they are single player related
BGS is surprising, surely they aren’t laying off actual devs on Starfield?
The last studio that should be getting any layoffs is BGS
They need about 1000 additional employees.
Man this sucks. Hope those affected land a new job quickly.
Not wholly surprised that 343 and BGS are the ones most affected though 343 with restructuring and BGS with their own publisher structure still intact.
Saw some social media managers were fired on twitter not sure about devs though, but it still sucks ass.
This is awful news , and it’s the many fears of consolidation that is happening in the industry. It’s one of the things that should be looked at for regulatory bodies because I don’t think should be throwing money around if you can’t give assurance to current employees if their jobs are safe. I know this post might not be liked, but I have to say it because the human side of things get crushed when dealing with the pains of capitalism and we need to fight against that.
And The Coalition it seems.
What are you doing to “fight” against capitalism?
Sucks a lot, there was a massive expansion at IT from the pandemic but now the expectations are a recession + previous issues from before. Wonder what was the reason to be fired at the gaming division though.
Let’s be honest… it’s not hard to imagine why 343i is under scrutiny. I just don’t see how Halo has performed near expectation. Especially during a global pandemic…
You have to wonder how much money and talent Microsoft is willing to invest in the IP, especially when the ActiBlizz acquisition is finalized (if ever). At that point… how important will Halo be for the Microsoft Gaming organization?
News like this always sucks hear, especially when it hits so many people.