New round of job cuts at Microsoft

Mary Jo Foley reports that Microsoft has started its second round of planned cuts, with emphasis on sales, marketing, and support.

When the layoff announcement came in January, MS immediately cut 1,400 people, anticipating that 3,600 more would be cut in the ensuing 18 months. Looks like this round of cuts will come close to the 3,600.

Roughly half the people cut are in the US, the others are overseas.

Still, MS expects to hire 2,000 to 3,000 more people in the next year, primarily for its Online Systems Division, which has been enormously unprofitable, according to MS’s latest earnings report. Online Systems seems poised to post a $2,000,000,000 loss this fiscal year, ending June 30, 2009, give or take a penny.