Microsoft is reportedly planning more layoffs, as the company will reportedly announce 700 additional job cuts next week.
The new layoffs are part of the strategy Microsoft announced back in 2016, when it revealed plans to axe 2,850 jobs globally by mid-2017.
New Microsoft Job Cuts
The company is now expected to announce 700 job cuts when it reports its quarterly earnings next week, according to a new report from Business Insider.
The layoffs will span across several Microsoft divisions including mobile, claims the report. Microsoft's mobile division already took a big hit with the whole deal with Nokia's Devices and Services, but the company may not be done reorganizing it just yet.
While the previous round of job cuts mainly focused on mobile, it also affected other divisions within the company. It remains to be seen what Microsoft has in mind with the new round of layoffs and which divisions will be most affected.
The layoffs planned for this year follow the extensive round of job cuts back in 2014, when Microsoft axed more than 18,000 jobs after purchasing Nokia's smartphone business. That was part of the biggest layoffs Microsoft ever conducted, so the 700 jobs reportedly being cut next week pale in comparison.
Microsoft has yet to make it official, but considering that the company already announced last year that it will cut 2,850 jobs by the end of the fiscal year, the new Business Insider report could well be accurate.
Current Microsoft Workforce
For now, Microsoft has 113,000 employees globally, 64,000 of which are located in the United States. Although the company is expected to announce more layoffs, Microsoft is also looking for new employees in a number of areas.
The Microsoft Careers webpage currently lists a number of available positions for managers, engineers, and developers for instance, so even if the company is axing some positions in some departments, it's also adding others. Microsoft currently has more than 1,600 job openings listed on LinkedIn.
Business Insider notes that things are currently tense at Microsoft, as employees keep hearing rumors of hundreds of jobs being cut.
"Most of the 2,850 roles scheduled to be cut have already been eliminated, according to the person familiar with the matter. The upcoming cuts won't be specific to any single group, but will be spread across the company's worldwide offices and business units, including sales, marketing, human resources, engineering, finance and more," notes the report.
Business Insider further points out that the upcoming layoffs don't aim to cut costs, but to spice up the skills within various units. At the same time, with Microsoft still hiring other employees, the 700 job cuts won't have much impact on the overall size of the company's workforce.
If the report turns out to be accurate and Microsoft plans to announce the job cuts upon revealing its quarterly earnings, we'll get the official news straight from the source soon enough. As always, we'll keep you in the loop as soon as more information becomes available, but take rumors and reports with a grain of salt in the meantime.
