Oracle to Cut 3,000 India Jobs Microsoft Puts 500 on PIPs

Oracle plans to cut about 3,000 jobs in India from September 1, while Microsoft has placed roughly 500 Indian staff on performance improvement plans.

Oracle is preparing to remove roughly 3,000 roles from its India operations, while Microsoft has placed around 500 of its Indian employees on performance improvement plans (PIPs). The moves land as major technology firms rework their teams and shift budgets toward newer priorities such as artificial intelligence.

Pareekh Jain, chief executive of the market research firm EIIRTrend, told ET that close to 2% of Microsoft's India workforce - roughly 400 to 500 people - could be caught up in the company's global PIP round. He put Oracle's expected reductions at between 2,000 and 3,000 staff, with the cuts due to begin on September 1. Oracle has about 30,000 workers in India and had already dropped around 12,000 positions in the country during an earlier round.

A Microsoft spokesperson said the firm runs a formal PIP process alongside a global voluntary separation programme. Staff who miss the expectations set for their jobs may receive coaching, be placed on a PIP, be offered voluntary exit, or be let go. The spokesperson described the global share of employees on PIPs as very small and said the company does not discuss individual cases or break out figures by region.

Not the same as layoffs

Several analysts cautioned against reading the PIP numbers as disguised job cuts. Gaurav Vasu, who heads the research firm UnearthInsight, said the 2% India figure should not be taken as proof that firms are swapping layoffs for performance-based exits. He said involuntary or PIP-linked attrition usually sits between 1% and 2% of staff, driven by skill gaps or performance concerns, and called the reported figure part of routine management.

Vasu framed Oracle's overhaul as a change in the abilities and roles the company wants to back. In his view, the restructuring moves spending away from older sales roles toward emerging skills, and combines PIPs with a broader tilt toward AI-focused work as budgets are redirected.

Kamal Karanth, co-founder of the staffing company Xpheno, said PIPs are meant to give workers a chance to raise their performance rather than serve as a substitute for layoffs. He expects AI's effect on engineering jobs to grow clearer over the coming two to three years, with junior and mid-level engineers handling simpler tasks facing the sharpest exposure.

Freshers left waiting

The pressure is falling hardest on new graduates. Large technology employers have grown wary of campus recruitment, and a rising number are pushing back the start dates of fresh hires, leaving candidates unsure when their careers will begin. Earlier this year, firms including IBM, Accenture, Oracle Financial Services Software and Cognizant told recruits that joining dates would hinge on project availability, business needs and administrative steps. Some engineering graduates waited months, and in certain cases more than a year, before starting.

Analysts say recruitment now tracks specific projects and real demand, rather than mass hiring of freshers to stock the bench. That reset shows in the numbers. India's five biggest IT firms cut a combined net 6,981 jobs in FY26 after adding 12,718 in FY25. Nasscom estimates the wider industry workforce grew by just 1.35 lakh to 5.9 million in 2026.

There are early signs of a turn. The country's six largest IT companies added a net 5,400 employees in the first quarter of FY27, reversing a net loss of 7,100 jobs in the previous quarter. TCS drove much of that gain, adding a net 9,000 people - its biggest quarterly increase in three years.

As the older hiring model fades, Global Capability Centres (GCCs) - the offshore arms of multinationals that run technology, engineering, finance, research, analytics and other operations for their parent companies - are emerging as significant employers of tech talent. HR professionals, though, do not see them as a straight replacement for campus recruitment. Their hiring leans toward specialised areas such as AI, data analytics, product development, cybersecurity and digital engineering, rather than bulk intake of fresh graduates.

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