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Microsoft appears to be making significant layoffs across Australia and New Zealand as the global economy heads south.
A post this morning by Daniel Larsen, principal customer experience engineer at Microsoft's local FastTrack for Azure team based in New Zealand, said that entire team had been laid off.
"After seven wonderful years at Microsoft I, along with the rest of the FastTrack for Azure NZ team, have been laid off as Microsoft cuts costs globally," Larsen wrote.
"While this is disappointing, it’s also an opportunity to reset and try something new."
Larsen described five other affected employees as "world class engineers experienced in deploying large and complex Azure workloads".
"Please also reach out to them with job opportunities," he asked as other industry figures extended their best wishes.
In January, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella signaled up to 10,000 staff would go to align Microsoft's cost and revenue structure while investing in expected growth areas.
Microsoft NZ told Reseller News the redundancies were spread across more than one geography and business team as well as role and tenure.
Customer-facing Azure cloud engineer Victor Worapon Viriyaampanond has also been laid off after more than a decade with Microsoft.
"My role along with thousands others were impacted by the recent layoff," he wrote in a post, adding he was now seeking new employment as a principal cloud solution architect or cloud engineering team lead.
"It’s saddening that I have to leave this workplace that I called home," he wrote. "I will miss many colleagues that some I would considered friends.
"I’m grateful for opportunities, learning, and experience that I can’t imagine getting elsewhere. Thank you everyone who was a part of my career here."
John Downs, a principial engineer, also fell in what he described as "the latest round of layoffs".
"I’m still working out what my next step might look like," he posted. "But if anybody is aware of any opportunities that they think might suit my expertise, please let me know."
Downs specialises in designing and architecting SaaS solutions, cloud architecture, especially for Azure and DevOps and infrastructure as code.
Larsen concluded his post offering "huge thanks and love" to his FastTrack for Azure family: "Ngā mihi nui kia koutou. Arohanui."
In Australia, Microsoft's enterprise channel manager, Rab Thynne posted that he was laid off to make way for the new partnering structure, but he leaves with very fond memories.
"All that said, I think what they are doing is the right thing for the market and being a shareholder, I hope it is successful," Thynne posted. "I wanted to thank the thousands of people that I have had the opportunity to work with around the world. I got to see things that other people could only dream about, and I have had the pleasure to be part of bringing three new businesses to market including Office 365 and Azure."
Thynne said he will be taking some time off before potentially launching new partnering services later in the year.
