Mass lay-offs at Microsoft as company downsizes several gaming, tech departments

Microsoft has let go of hundreds of employees across several departments.

According to sources close to Insider, under 1,000 staff members, part of departments including Xbox, members of the chief technology officer’s department, Studio Alpha, and the Strategic Missions and Technology organization were laid off.

No one seems to be safe, with Microsoft’s Mission Engineering team also in the crosshairs. 

This unfortunate series of lay-offs has reportedly been on the cards for quite some time within the tech giant, with Microsoft announcing they’d be letting go of one percent of their staff in June this year. But, this may still be a completely unrelated set of circumstances.

These changes were set to affect roughly 1,800 people in the company.

On the business front, Microsoft’s recent acquisition of Activision stirred quite a bit of controversy amongst several different strains of government and caused discussion among fellow gaming companies.

Activision Blizzard has been dealing with a series of sexual harassment lawsuits too. The most recent lawsuit was earlier this month and alleged one Overwatch 2 developer made revenge porn threats and groped a fellow worker.