Microsoft offers a quarter of its workforce voluntary buyouts

Microsoft has offered voluntary buyouts to 60,000 employees, more than a quarter of its global workforce.

The offer was made to around 27% of the software giant’s staff worldwide, according to Amy Coleman, the company’s Chief People Officer.

Coleman announced the move in a blog post on Monday and said that the voluntary exit offer was open to eligible employees in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada and India.

“The Voluntary Exit Offer is new for us,” Coleman wrote. “We’ll learn from it. At the same time, we’ll keep helping people focus on the work that matters most, build new skills and, where it makes sense, find new opportunities across Microsoft.”

Microsoft, based in Redmond, Washington, had approximately 223,000 full-time employees at the end of June. The company is due to publish its quarterly financial results on Wednesday.

Its shares hit an all-time high this month, and the stock rose about 1% on Monday.

The buyout plan is far larger than one previously reported for the company’s US operations.

In May, Microsoft planned to offer buyouts to about 8,750 people, or 7% of its US workforce, according to two people familiar with the plan who were not authorized to speak about it publicly.

In July, the company said it was cutting 4,800 jobs, about 2.1% of its global workforce, including a large number of workers at its Xbox video game business.

The buyouts come as Microsoft spends heavily on artificial intelligence.

The gusher of investment in data centers – likely topping $700 billion this year – to power artificial intelligence has made memory chips, computer processors and other equipment, as well as electricity, more expensive.

Economists expect it will continue to push up inflation at least through the end of this year.

Microsoft has been ramping up its AI capabilities for several years.