Microsoft is planning to halt hiring in part of its consulting business in the US in a bid to cut costs, CNBC reported citing an internal memo.
The tech giant is looking to manage overall expenses as it looks to continue investments in its artificial intelligence (AI) efforts.
Earlier this month, Microsoft said it planned to invest about US$80 billion (A$129 billion) in fiscal 2025 on developing data centres to train AI models and deploy AI and cloud-based applications.
The consulting division will hold off on hiring new employees and back-filling roles to reduce costs, consulting executive Derek Danois told employees, as per the memo.
Microsoft did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment.
Careful management of costs is of utmost importance, Danois wrote. The memo also instructs employees to not expense travel for any internal meetings and use remote sessions instead.
The changes by the US consulting division are meant to align with a policy by the Microsoft Customer and Partner Solutions organisation, which has about 60,000 employees.
The unit will also cut its marketing and non-billable external resource spend by 35 percent, the report said.