Just this past week, Microsoft kicked off another round of mass layoffs. Over 9,000 employees from Microsoft were laid off, many of which were from various Xbox divisions and studios. Several in-development games were cancelled and an entire studio was shut down. These layoffs are in addition to the 6,000 that were carried out in May 2025 at Microsoft, and the few thousand layoffs made in 2024.
This means that in 2025 alone, Microsoft has laid off over 15,000 people. According to a report from The Seattle Times, Microsoft has been trying to reduce the number of employees in order to free up additional capital for spending on AI infrastructure and technology.
Microsoft already announced that they are planning to spend $80 billion on AI infrastructure over the coming year. Like many tech companies, they are betting huge on AI and want to use that $80 billion to keep up with the demands of AI.
Microsoft has been keen to shove AI into pretty much everything for the past couple of years now. They have added their Copilot AI into Windows, their Office products, and Bing search results.
Microsoft is also coming off of one of its most successful years. The company is now second only to Nvidia as the most valuable company in the world. This echoes statements shared by Xbox lead Phil Spencer in last week's statement about the layoffs across Xbox. In his memo to staff, Spencer says that the Xbox "platform, hardware, and game roadmap have never looked stronger."
Over 15,000 people should be thrilled to hear that they were laid off from the second most valuable company in the world all because their former employer wants extra money to spend on AI crap.
