Microsoft has subjected the Russian office to restructuring. Employees were offered to transfer from Russia to other countries.
Last week, rumors spread online that Microsoft intends to leave Russia. Suspicions of this arose when a number of price tags for products in the Microsoft Store began to be indicated in dollars instead of rubles. Yesterday, Microsoft explained that the need to transfer prices was dictated by the “development of a business approach” and that the company would remain committed to the Russian market in any case.
However, according to the Telegram channel “Non-digital Economy”, right now Microsoft’s Russian representative office is downsizing. Employees are transferred to other EMEA countries (European, Middle Eastern and Asian). Moreover, they can choose to work remotely if they do not want to move.
An App2Top source confirmed that several departments were cut in the Russian representative office at once and that some of the employees were being transferred to other regions. According to him, the restructuring has been going on for a year.
There are several versions explaining why the company has to reduce staff:
- US sanctions. Under their influence, the Russian distributors of Microsoft (RRC and Merlion) at the beginning of the year limited the supply of software for 200 corporate clients in the Russian Federation and reduced the terms of payment for licenses to them. Distributors were forced to do this – otherwise they would face heavy fines.
- Russian import substitution. Government agencies and state-owned companies of the Russian Federation are obliged to purchase Russian analogues of software specified in the special register of the Ministry of Communications. In this regard, the demand for Microsoft software in Russian public procurement could fall significantly. It should be noted that the main state client of the company in the Russian Federation was Sberbank, which brought it annual revenue of 130-470 million rubles.
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