• Analysis
Microsoft quarterly revenue hits $92.3bn as buyouts offered to 60,000 staff
Microsoft reported quarterly revenue of $92.3bn on Wednesday, beating analyst expectations, two days after offering voluntary buyouts to about 60,000 employees.
Earnings beat expectations
Microsoft's quarterly revenue reached $92.3bn in the September quarter, ahead of analyst forecasts of around $90.6bn. Profit came in at more than $36.6bn, exceeding the roughly $35.1bn that analysts had expected, according to FactSet. The company disclosed the results in a securities filing on Wednesday, and its shares added billions of dollars in stock market value that afternoon.
Azure drives the growth
The Azure cloud computing division grew 48% in the quarter and drove the overall rise in Microsoft's quarterly earnings. CEO Satya Nadella said in a statement:
"We are delivering greater capability, choice, control, and cost-efficiency for customers across our entire stack."
Second buyout round this year
Two days before the results were filed, Microsoft offered voluntary buyouts to about 60,000 employees, roughly a quarter of its workforce. It is the company's second such offer this year, after seven percent of its US workforce were given the option to retire early in April.
- •About 60,000 employees were offered voluntary buyouts in the latest round
- •Roughly a quarter of the workforce was affected
- •In April, seven percent of US staff could opt for early retirement
- •Microsoft had 223,000 employees globally at the end of June, down from 228,000 at the end of 2025
AI spending and new hardware
The buyouts come as Microsoft spends heavily on artificial intelligence investments. Earlier in October, the company announced a Surface Ultra laptop running Nvidia's AI chips, priced at more than $2,500. Apple announced a similar touchscreen MacBook the same week. The hardware push aims to handle more AI computing on-device and offline, so users do not have to rely solely on remote cloud datacenters, where AI is slower and costlier. The buyout offer was made two days before the results were filed.
