Internal Microsoft CFO Memo Touts 'Increased Pace' and 'Tighter' Teams
Exclusive By Ashley Stewart Microsoft reported third-quarter results on Wednesday. CFO Amy Hood sent an internal memo to employees thanking them for 'increased pace.' The company has introduced sweeping organizational shifts and mandates to work faster and leaner, consolidating power around AI leaders and reshaping product development and funding. Hood wrote in the memo: 'Thank you for the way you showed up this quarter — with focused execution and increased pace as the opportunity ahead of us grows.' The memo highlighted Microsoft Cloud revenue at $54.5 billion and AI revenue surpassing $37 billion in annual run rate, up 123%. Earlier in April, Microsoft offered buyouts to long-serving employees, affecting up to 7% of its US workforce. The company’s financial results included strong growth in Azure and other cloud services revenue (40% and 39% growth), Microsoft 365 commercial cloud revenue (19% and 15% growth), and M365 Copilot scaling to over 20 million paid seats. Microsoft 365 consumer cloud revenue increased 33% and 33% in constant currency, with subscriber growth of 7%. Commercial bookings grew 7% excluding OpenAI’s impact. Total commercial remaining performance obligation rose to $627 billion. Microsoft invested $31.9 billion in capex for GPUs, CPUs, and datacenter infrastructure. Bing monthly active users reached one billion for the first time, and Edge took share for 20 consecutive quarters. Xbox content and services revenue decreased 5% and 7%, while LinkedIn revenue grew 12% and 9%. Microsoft announced price changes to Game Pass subscriptions to refocus on value for fans. The memo emphasized progress in tighter, more accountable squads and new agentic Copilot capabilities across Word, Excel, and PowerPoint. As the company moves into Q4, its biggest quarter of the year, Hood urged employees to finish strong with quality and security.
Source: Business Insider