Amid Secret Shut-downs and Mass Layoffs at Microsoft (4 Waves of Layoffs in 3 Months of 2025) Some Microsoft Staff Expected to Go On Strike
Yesterday we published a pair of short articles about mass layoffs at Microsoft China [1, 2]. Microsoft managed to keep that hidden for a while, but local media from Hong Kong went to the sites and verified rumours of shutdowns.
That not only indicated financial problems; it also served to show that the "hey hi" (AI) bubble was quietly imploding.
Now, after many thousands of layoffs in the struggling gaming division (Microsoft loses a lot of money there, especially in XBox; it's trying to cut costs), there is the possibility of workers going on strike.
"The QA department at ZeniMax, which operates Bethesda and was purchased by Microsoft for $7.5 billion back in 2021, voted 94 percent in favor of authorizing a strike," according to this hours-old report from Kotaku. Let's wait and see. That's a very strong majority. █