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Microsoft Lays Off 2,100, Axes Silicon Valley Research

Posted by ryuzaki0 on from the end-of-the-line dept.

walterbyrd writes with news of Microsoft layoffs. Microsoft Corp will close its Silicon Valley research-and-development operation as part of 2,100 layoffs announced on Thursday, as it moves toward its new CEO's goal of cutting 18,000 staff, or about 14 percent of its workforce. News of the closure of the Microsoft Research lab at the company's campus in Mountain View, California, was first made public on Twitter by employees. The company later confirmed the move and said it would involve the loss of 50 jobs.

9 of 109 comments (clear)

  1. No more cash in the bank? by suso · · Score: 4, Funny

    Back around 2000 when Microsoft had something like $100 billion in the bank I said that with that kind of money, they could afford to make no income and still pay their 40,000 or so employees at the time for the next 13 years. I wasn't serious though.

    1. Re:No more cash in the bank? by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 4, Insightful

      I do wish it didn't involve reducing the size of their research operations.

      Why? Microsoft has a long history of hiring many top researchers, and then doing very little with the results. It is much better for those researchers to be more productively employed elsewhere. The researchers will have little trouble finding new positions in Silicon Valley, where talent is in high demand.

    2. Re:No more cash in the bank? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Google tells me they have $84 billion dollars and spent $37 billion in the past year.

      Google also tells us that Microsoft is one of the heaviest lobbyists for increases to H1Bs. That should tell you how ethical this plan to layoffs workers really is.

  2. Let's spend 2.5 billion on Minecraft by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The employees we could have paid with that 2.5 billion are a useless drag on our bottom line.

  3. Wait for it in 3...2...1... by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Insightful

    "We desperately need more H1B's to manage the staff reduction! We cannot afford to retrain our existing employees in staff reduction management technologies." -MS

    --
    Table-ized A.I.
  4. Hmmmmm by JWW · · Score: 4, Interesting

    When the announcement that cuts were coming I made a comment on /. about how everyone at Microsoft would be looking over their shoulder wondering whether their job would be cut.

    Howling responses insisted that no, the only jobs being cut were going to be in Finland and tied to Nokia.

    Now we find out that jobs are being cut in Washington, Silicon Valley, and Fargo. Hmmm, thats a long way from Finland.

  5. The more things change, the more they stay the sam by pkinetics · · Score: 3, Informative

    Layoffs in the USA, and hiring increases elsewhere.

    I remember a few years back reading how MS was proclaiming that they weren't increasing their H1B hirings. However, they were achieving the same results by doing it in Canada instead.

    More recent layoffs

    http://www.murthy.com/2014/05/...

  6. Re:Solution: Financial Independence by DivineKnight · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Nada. We're in the middle of some of the worst right now. There's a piece up somewhere...can't remember if the link was on fark, gawker, or vice...but they gave a decent explanation of things are being run today (look for the Olive Garden piece) -> there is zero interest is keeping these companies alive, now it's about stripping them of their assets, and getting them to pay a hefty dividend. Feel me? Microsoft today is not the Microsoft of yesterday; Microsoft of yesterday made software; Microsoft of today is a corporate giant that could cut all of its employees, sell off then lease the buildings it currently occupies, sell off its name in certain areas (Microsoft ice cream, etc.), and so on. It's going to die only after it's been pimped out to every piece of gutter trash that the Street can find. And it's brain? Completely controlled by people with the worst intentions for it. It's like one of those zombified snails.

  7. What about the Turing Award winners? by tgeller · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Microsoft's Pear Street office across the street houses at least two ACM A.M. Turing Award winners: Leslie Lamport and Chuck Thacker (http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/news/features/lamport-031814.aspx). I wonder what the company will do with them, if anything....

    (I had the honor of interviewing Dr. Lamport when he won: See http://vimeo.com/95177539 . Nice guy!)

    --
    Tom Geller