Microsoft CEO’s pay rises 63% to $79m, despite devastating year for layoffs

Microsoft boss Satya Nadella will earn a wallet-busting $79.1m (£60.9m) this financial year, up 63 percent on his compensation for 2023.

The huge boost to Nadella’s pay in both cash and stock, announced by Microsoft last night, comes after a positive year overall for the company’s financial revenues – but a turbulent 12 months for its employees.

2024 has seen two mass layoffs at Microsoft, with 1900 staff laid off in January, before a further 650 Xbox employees were shown the door in September.

Regardless, Microsoft’s shares are up and the company’s market value is now higher than $3tn, as it works to capitalise on the rise of AI.

Microsoft moved to shut down three Bethesda gaming studios in June – Arkane Austin, the now-external Tango Gameworks, and Alpha Dog – as Xbox boss Phil Spencer discussed a lack of overall growth in the console market.

Writing in Microsoft’s 2024 Annual Report, released last night, Nadella painted a rosier picture, however.

“We are bringing great games to more people on more devices,” Nadella wrote. “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 $1bn 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.”

That cross-platform publishing programme will continue over the next few months with the arrival of Indiana Jones and the Great Circle for PC and Xbox in December, and PlayStation in February 2025, with the expectation that other games will then follow.