How will Microsoft’s planned layoffs affect ChatGPT’s integration into BIng?

This week, Microsoft made an announcement that highlighted its plan to cut 10,000 jobs over the next three months. The company’s CEO further highlighted that the move will help them “adapt to platform shifts” and that they will be taking a $1.2 billion charge in revolving around changes in hardware portfolio, severance cost, and more.

The layoffs will be reportedly spread across different divisions within the company, including teams handling web products like Bing and Edge as well as the ones handling devices like the Surface Hub, as spotted by Business Insider.

Microsoft’s Web Experience Team, WebXT will also be impacted by this change. The team is responsible for building engaging and informative content, services, and platforms for users that can be accessed anywhere on the web.

With the WebXT team also taking a hit from these massive layoffs, what does this mean for the ChatGPT-powered Bing? Earlier this month, there was an indication that Microsoft was working closely with OpenAI to integrate ChatGPT into Bing in a bid to enhance the search experience for users and provide human-like responses. Another report also highlighted that Microsoft was planning to inject a $10 billion investment to ensure that its plans come to fruition.

According to Business Insider’s sources, Microsoft laying off high-earning employees across various divisions is a strategy devised in that it can now hire new employees at significantly low rates and uses their services in “investment areas” such as Bing. Another source also told the Insider that it was possible that some of the tasks being done by the WebXT team were being duplicated by Microsoft’s OpenAI partnership thus creating redundancy.

It seems the layoffs will further affect employees in the devices division, particularly those in the Surface Hub whiteboard team, gaming, recruitment, sales, human resource as well as consulting roles. As such, the affected parties will remain employed for 60 days. They won’t be required to report to work, instead employees on visas will be expected to use this time to seek employment elsewhere so that they don’t have to go back to their motherland. What’s more, they’ll receive a minimum of one month of severance based on tenure.

Microsoft is expected to launch the revamped Bing sometime in March, we will have to wait and see what’s in store for us and the implications these changes have. Share your thoughts with us in the comment section.

via: Business Insider