Microsoft offers buyouts to 60,000 staff to fund AI

Sixty thousand Microsoft employees received voluntary buyout offers on Monday.

The company announced the move to control expenses while financing large artificial intelligence projects.

Microsoft reported 223,000 full-time employees worldwide as of June 30.

The new offer covers more than a quarter of that global headcount.

A source familiar with the private details told Reuters that the offer applies to staff in specific divisions.

Included units are AI experiences, Copilot, finance, human resources, Xbox, and Windows plus Devices.

The source noted that marketing, commercial business, and security teams are excluded from the list.

Amy Coleman, the company's executive vice president and chief people officer, outlined the geographic scope in a staff memo.

Eligible workers in Canada, India, the United Kingdom, and the United States can participate.

"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.

She added that the program helps organizations adapt their workforce to changing needs.

Microsoft declined to provide a specific count of Canadian employees included in the offer to CBC News on Monday morning, though the company stated the program is time-limited and voluntary. The initiative builds on a previous voluntary retirement program, and eligible staff will receive specific details within hours. The company is scheduled to report first-quarter financial results after markets close on Wednesday. Microsoft has forecast capital expenditures of $175 billion US for the 2026 calendar year, a figure that has drawn investor scrutiny regarding returns on massive data centre and chip investments. Shares of the tech giant, which had risen about 10 per cent earlier this year, increased by about 1 per cent on Monday following the announcement. This development follows an earlier move this year where the company offered buyouts to about 7 per cent of its U.S. workforce, or roughly 9,000 people. In July, Microsoft also announced a reduction of 4,800 jobs, or about 2.1 per cent of its global workforce, as it overhauled its Xbox gaming business and divested up to five studios.