Microsoft offers buyouts to 60,000 employees, about a quarter of its staff

Amy Coleman, Microsoft’s chief people officer, announced the Voluntary Exit Offer in a memo to employees on Monday. It is open to eligible staff in participating teams in Canada, India, the UK and the US, at level 70 and below on Microsoft’s internal scale. The offer is voluntary and time-limited, and comes with financial support and career planning resources, she wrote.

About 60,000 employees are eligible for the Microsoft buyouts, Bloomberg first reported. Microsoft confirmed the figure to Todd Bishop of GeekWire. That is about a quarter of its workforce, which stood at 223,000 at the end of June.

“This offer gives eligible employees who may be considering a future outside the company a new choice to make that transition now with support,” Coleman wrote.

What the offer pays

The package matches Microsoft’s standard severance, the company told GeekWire. It includes base pay based on tenure and level, continued stock vesting, healthcare for a fixed period and career transition services. Employees have until the first week of December to decide.

There is no age or tenure requirement, and performance is not a factor, Microsoft said. Level 70 takes in general managers and some employees with vice president titles, but not corporate vice presidents.

Business leaders decide whether their teams take part. The sales organisation is not participating, nor are some engineering groups and corporate functions, the company said. Eligible teams include Copilot, CoreAI, Windows + Devices, Xbox, finance and HR, while security, marketing and quantum are left out, sources told Emma Roth and Tom Warren of The Verge.

After retirements and layoffs

The offer follows Microsoft’s first voluntary retirement programme in the spring. That was limited to US employees at senior director level and below whose age and years of service met a threshold. About 30% of the roughly 8,750 who were eligible took it, according to GeekWire. Microsoft told GeekWire it expects a much smaller share to accept this time.

Microsoft cut 4,800 jobs in July, including 3,200 at Xbox, and 268 more Xbox jobs went in September. The company said the new offer does not replace layoffs, which remain an option depending on business conditions. A spokesperson told GeekWire the offer is not a sign that Microsoft needs fewer employees.

Microsoft reports quarterly earnings on Wednesday. It booked a $900m charge for the retirement programme in its April earnings report.