It’s been another turbulent year for Microsoft. We’ve seen several announcements of layoffs, with Microsoft laying off another 650 employees just last month, and this is now contrasted with the news that CEO Satya Nadella has seen a sizeable pay raise of 63%, increasing Nadella’s compensation for 2024’s fiscal year to over $79 million. Nadella has, meanwhile, shared an annual letter touching on some of the Xbox moves Microsoft has made, including the multiplatform release of Xbox games and how the team continues “to extend our content to new platforms.” Nadella has shared a lengthy letter (as spotted by The Verge’s Tom Warren) touching on everything from AI to security. The paragraph on gaming is relatively small, but it covers a fair bit:”We are bringing great games to more people on more devices. With our acquisition of Activision Blizzard King, which closed October 2023, we’ve added hundreds of millions of players to our ecosystem. We now have 20 franchises that have generated over $1 billion in lifetime revenue — from Candy Crush, Diablo, and Halo, to Warcraft, Elder Scrolls, and Gears of War. And with Xbox cloud gaming, we continue to innovate to offer players more ways to experience the games they love — where, when, and how they want. Finally, we brought four of our fan-favorite titles to Nintendo Switch and Sony PlayStation for the first time, as we continue to extend our content to new platforms.”It was big news in early 2024 when Microsoft confirmed four Xbox exclusives were moving on to other platforms, with Grounded and Pentiment among the titles moving to Nintendo Switch and PlayStation.Microsoft has also been in the news this year in regards to layoffs. January saw Microsoft laying off around 1,900 employees from across Xbox Game Studios, and studio closures and layoffs continued afterwards.It’s not just Nadella’s letter, however, which has caught attention. According to CNBC and a proxy filing from earlier this week, Microsoft’s pay raise for Nadella was over $30 million, with a large amount of this compensation consisting of stock. It would, apparently, have been more, if not for Nadella’s requested pay cut following Microsoft’s previous troubles with cyberattacks.All-in-all, it’s given Xbox players and those interested in Microsoft’s plans a lot to think about. If, however, you’d prefer some much more straightfoward news to celebrate it being a Friday, don’t forget that Call of Duty: Black Ops 6 joins Game Pass today!
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