Oracle and Salesforce Lead New Wave of Tech Layoffs in Seattle Amid AI Investments

Cloud computing giant Oracle lays off more Seattle workers

Cloud computing giant Oracle is laying off 101 employees in Seattle, less than a month after reducing its local workforce. The cuts from the Austin, Texas-based company, disclosed in a state regulatory filing, are the latest in a series of layoff waves hitting the tech industry this year. Since May, Oracle, along with cybersecurity firm F5, T-Mobile, Amazon and Microsoft, have all either announced or confirmed layoffs. Some waves have been large. Between several rounds over the last few months, Microsoft let go of more than 15,000 workers. Amazon confirmed an undisclosed amount of layoffs in July, but reports said it could have affected hundreds in the company's cloud division. Most of the tech companies that cut jobs this year have said the layoffs were a result of shifting priorities. As spending is focused on the artificial intelligence race, redundant roles and teams are getting the ax in favor of a streamlined workforce. The companies aren't blaming AI technology or saying roles are being replaced by automation. Rather, they're allocating resources differently. Outside of the AI race, the coffee giant Starbucks also said it was pushing for a slimmer, more efficient corporate workforce when it laid off more than 1,000 employees in February. But at least one company has said AI adoption is directly resulting in layoffs. Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff said that the company has replaced 4,000 customer service jobs with AI. Oracle did not respond to a request for comment and hasn't said what's driving layoffs at the company. Before the company laid off 161 workers in August and another 101 on September 2nd, Oracle had 3,900 employees in the Seattle area, according to the Puget Sound Business Journal. Oracle, which was one of the Seattle-area's largest tech employers aside from homegrown Amazon and Microsoft, has a dwindling physical footprint in Seattle and Bellevue as its workforce shrinks. The company, formerly headquartered in Silicon Valley, Calif., grew quickly in the half decade leading up to the pandemic. Like other Silicon Valley tech companies, Oracle turned its once small outpost in Seattle into one of its larger engineering hubs. But over the past few years, the hub's physical presence has shrunk. Last year, the company left its downtown Bellevue office. Oracle had occupied three floors in an office tower, according to city permit records. Commercial brokerage CBRE confirmed last year that Oracle decided not to renew the lease. Oracle also shed a sizable chunk of its space in downtown Seattle in 2023, according to CBRE. The brokerage reported Oracle left almost 100,000 square feet of space in Seattle's Century Square tower, near Westlake Park. 2025 The Seattle Times. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.

Hundreds of additional tech layoffs hit Seattle area Wednesday

The summer of tech layoffs doesn't seem to be coming to an end. Almost 200 Seattle-area tech workers were laid off this week in waves of workforce reductions from business-software maker Salesforce and cloud computing giant Oracle. San Francisco-based Salesforce let go of 93 employees between its Seattle and Bellevue offices, the company disclosed in a state regulatory filing Wednesday. On Tuesday, Austin, Texas-based Oracle laid off 101 workers in Seattle. The layoffs this week aren't isolated incidents. The broader tech workforce has been slammed by repeated cuts throughout the year with tech behemoths Amazon and Microsoft joining the trend. Local companies like cybersecurity firm F5 and telecom giant T-Mobile have also announced layoffs over the past few months. Many of the companies have justified the cuts by expressing the need for a streamlined workforce and vaguely gesturing to the hiring boom during the pandemic. Looming over much of the job turmoil in the industry is Big Tech's newest obsession: artificial intelligence. For some companies, the pressure comes from AI costs. Microsoft, which has laid off more than 15,000 employees globally since May, spent more than $80 billion over the past year building out its AI infrastructure. Microsoft plans to up its quarterly spending on the technology over the next few months. The company said workers aren't being replaced by AI. Microsoft President Brad Smith told GeekWire in July that those investments are creating pressure on the company's margins, leading to cost-cutting. But Salesforce says the AI technology it's adopting is replacing workers. CEO Marc Benioff said last week that the company was able to shrink its support roles by 4,000 as AI automates tasks. Salesforce did not respond to a request for comment on whether the layoffs in Seattle and Bellevue were a result of automation. Amazon, which reportedly laid off hundreds of workers in July, pointed to the same reason Microsoft did. The company said it was reviewing areas of the business that can be trimmed in a bid for efficiency. But the company has hinted at a more automated future with fewer corporate jobs. Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said in a June memo to employees that as AI spreads throughout the company, there will be fewer people needed to do current jobs with more people doing other types of jobs. "It's hard to know exactly where this nets out over time, but in the next few years, we expect that this will reduce our total corporate workforce as we get efficiency gains from using AI extensively across the company," he said. With Salesforce's layoffs, more than 4,170 Seattle-area employees have been let go from a tech company this year, according to state regulatory filings. Over 3,100 were Microsoft workers. Salesforce released third-quarter financial results Wednesday as well. The company reported more than $10.2 billion in revenue, up from $9.33 billion in the same quarter a year ago. Profit grew to $1.89 billion from $1.43 billion last year. Both beat Wall Street estimates. The stock price fell more than 5% in after-hours trading after Salesforce projected its revenue for the current quarter to come in below analysts' expectations. Seattle-area tech layoffs this year* * Microsoft: 3,160 * Oracle: 262 * Rec Room: 141 * Warner Bros. Discovery: 131 * T-Mobile: 121 * F5: 106 * Salesforce: 93 * Indeed: 92 * TikTok: 65 * Block: 4