Oracle cuts over 150 jobs in cloud unit amid surge in AI spending: Report
Oracle
is cutting jobs in its cloud unit in a bid to control costs amid heavy spending on artificial intelligence (
AI
) infrastructure, news agency
Bloomberg
reported, citing people familiar with the development.
Part of the layoffs were related to performance issues; however, the cloud unit continues to hire workers, as per the report, which cited two unnamed people.
Oracle
has cut more than 150 jobs in the Seattle area, which is the unit's hub. The cloud infrastructure solutions provider last year said it was shifting its headquarters to Nashville, and currently has more jobs listed in Tennessee than in any other state, according to the report.
Oracle did not respond to Bloomberg's queries. Datacenter Dynamics first reported on the job cuts.
Technology giants, grappling with the surging costs of AI, have sought to reduce expenses in other parts of the business either through job reductions, or by replacing humans with AI agents. Windows OS maker Microsoft, for instance, cut nearly 15,000 jobs this year, while Amazon and Meta Platforms Inc have also axed jobs.
Last month, Oracle's cloud unit inked a deal with OpenAI for a 4.5GW data center in the US. It is under pressure to build increasingly large data centers, costing over tens of billions of dollars, to meet demand for AI. Its free cash flow was negative in the fiscal year that ended in May, according to the report.
In a June filing, Oracle said that it periodically makes changes to its workforce due to strategy changes, reorganisations, or performance issues. 'These types of restructurings have resulted, and may in the future result, in increased restructuring costs and temporarily reduced productivity while employees adjust to the restructuring," it had said.
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