Microsoft’s move to spend more on staff follows similar moves by rivals in its core cloud-computing sector.
Photo:
Chona Kasinger/Bloomberg News
Microsoft Corp.’s
MSFT 0.15%
chief executive is promising to boost employee compensation amid continued low unemployment across the U.S. and high inflation.
Satya Nadella
told Microsoft employees Monday that the software giant plans to nearly double its global budget for merit-based salary raises, a person familiar with the announcement said. Mr. Nadella also said the company would increase annual stock compensation by at least 25%, the person said.
The move comes as U.S. inflation remained close to a four-decade high in April.
“This increased investment in our worldwide compensation reflects the ongoing commitment we have to providing a highly competitive experience for our employees,” a Microsoft spokeswoman said. The move by Microsoft was earlier reported by trade publication GeekWire.
Microsoft’s readiness to spend more on staff follows similar moves by rivals in its core cloud-computing sector. Late last year,
Alphabet Inc.’s
GOOG -1.48%
Google announced a new cash bonus plan that lets employees receive bonuses of nearly any size for nearly any reason. In February,
Amazon.com Inc.
said it would double its cash-pay cap for employees.
Microsoft has also seen competition for talent elsewhere. Its augmented reality HoloLens team has experienced a large number of employees being poached by
owner
Meta
Platforms Inc. For employees with experience building augmented reality hardware, Meta was willing to double salary for some Microsoft employees, people familiar with the situation said.
More recently, some companies in tech have signaled they were becoming more thrifty. Meta and
Twitter Inc.,
have both said they were pulling back on staff additions and spending.
Write to Aaron Tilley at aaron.tilley@wsj.com
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Appeared in the May 17, 2022, print edition as ‘Microsoft CEO Vows To Increase Salaries.’
