--CIO.com
AS Microsoft grows smaller and more feeble [1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7], more of its products get dropped (more on that in the next post). But the other day we wrote about the fashion in which it is shrinking, namely by starting the layoffs from its home country.
The company would not disclose an exact number of layoffs in Boise, but sources said the local impact would be less than a dozen jobs.
Roughly 40 percent of Microsoft's 96,000 employees work outside the United States. The company has subsidiaries in countries from Albania to Zimbabwe. How are the layoffs announced last week impacting Microsoft's employees around the globe?
[...]
The Economic Times, part of Indiatimes, quoted a Microsoft spokesperson in New Delhi last week saying of the layoff, "It's not going to impact us. No job cuts in India."
'I can confirm that the number of employees affected by the immediate job eliminations is a single-digit number across Asia-Pacific, excluding China, India and Japan,' a company spokeswoman told BizIT.
Majority of the 60,000 professionals given H-1B visa every year are from India.
"Microsoft has a moral obligation to protect these American workers by putting them first during these difficult economic times," the Senator said.
It was only last March that Bill Gates himself argued to Congress that the H-1B visa limits needed to be lifted, because Microsoft just couldn't get enough skilled workers. But Microsoft was going through a crazy manic phase back then, as evidenced by its Yahoo infatuation. Now that Microsoft needs fewer skilled workers, should the H-1Bs get the ax first?
“This manipulation in Washington is something we will definitely revisit in the future.”For the curious: "About the two Firms JAG worked for: - - The firm of William H. Gates Sr., father of Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, merged with Preston in 1990. The later old line Seattle firm started when Harold Preston relocated to Seattle from Iowa in 1883 and began practicing law. Jim Ellis joined Preston in 1949. Members of JAG were registered lobbyists for Microsoft. During the 90's PGE became a Top 10 lobbying Firm based on lobbying gross revenue. Much of their lobbying success and revenue was due to the success of JAG."
The exploration here is seemingly endless and we had a go at it before. The latest complaint from the senator is also covered in:
With 2008 behind us, I wanted to look back and plot how search engine market share changed over the year in the United States. No surprises here. Pick your numbers, Google grew and grew. Yahoo and Microsoft dropped by lately have leveled off.
Microsoft won't disclose full extent of job cuts
So, in short, we're not going to be getting much more info from Microsoft. We do have to say though, considering all the nice, helpful people that have recently lost their gigs, that last sentence is pretty icy.
Comments
mpz
2009-01-28 21:17:22
The H1B system is good for the USA in a big way, although it has probably been somewhat abused by MS, but still, what sort of country do you want to live in? Not to mention, if the USA wants to impose it's free-trade mantra on the rest of the world, it has to accept the free trade of labour as well.
It is obvious the lay-offs were merely a token measure to try to satisfy the market (which it did badly), and it seems the layoffs were spread across all sorts of areas and nationalities at that. It just seemed to be about making up an arbitrary 'savings' number. If the comments on minimsft are to be believed, they were hardly trimming the fat, nor streamlining the business. The whole process seems to have been most completely ballmered up.
twitter
2009-01-28 23:49:21
There's a clear point being made here - The economics of non free software can only be sustained by actual slavery.
Roy Schestowitz
2009-01-29 00:01:28
Without going too deep into historical references, let it be clear that many companies seek to employ cheaper labour in countries where work is mundanely requiring longer hours. It is sometimes used as a form of ransom so 'pampered' western employees will accept abuse, lose their right to organise, and see their wages and welfare degrade. That's one of the dangers or trade agreements and even globalisation; it gives more power for large corporations (aka "private tyrannies") to drive down conditions/benefits while stripping off basic rights.
Other examples include car makers opening factories in places like Poland, not to mention the use of a temporary workforce and the practice of sweat shops.