Microsoft London announced that the company will be laying off hundreds of employees, along with its plan to move location to Paddington. Microsoft has been having huge cuts in the past few years after acquiring Skype, Yammer, and Nokia. Microsoft is reportedly not doing well in the phone business that caused the cuts, but the company is still seen as the top performer in gaming consoles, beating the Sony PS4.
Reports have told of the Microsoft London's plan of shutting down their Skype offices in London resulting in the loss of roughly 220 jobs. The Redmond-based tech company previously announced its plans of laying off 2,850 employees in the next year.
A Microsoft spokesperson reportedly said of the London cuts as the company's means of consolidating some engineering positions that affected both Skype and Yammer, ZDNet writer Mary Jo Foley said. Microsoft is set on going into a consultation process to offer new possibilities, the Microsoft spokesperson added. In the past weeks, Microsoft has already laid off 300 employees worldwide, mostly in the state of Washington as well as some employees based in Redmond where the tech company is headquartered.
In other news, Sony Interactive Entertainment CEO Andrew House took notice of Microsoft's recent jabs at PS4 Pro with the Xbox One clearly ahead of the two. He said that although a new and different Microsoft was reported(it was reorganized), it was rather short lived, the Welsh businessman said. The head of Microsoft's Xbox Division Phil Spencer reportedly ignored the comment and chose to focus on improving the Xbox. Sony's PS4 Pro will be released in November which may then be the game changer for the gaming console battle.
Microsoft London is only one part that suffers partly due to the major acquisitions of the company. In 2012, Microsoft acquired Yammer in June 2012, with Microsoft shelling out $1.2 billion. After that, the company bought Skype in October 2013 costing $8.5 billion. The tech company announced its plan to acquire Nokia which was completed in April 2014 and cost another $7.2 billion.