Global tech giant, Oracle, shed approximately 21,000 roles globally in the past year as the US technology giant restructures its operations around artificial intelligence.
The company disclosed this in its latest annual report.
Oracle’s full-time headcount fell from around 162,000 to 141,000 employees as of May 31, 2026.
The cuts, which amount to roughly 13% of Oracle’s total workforce, came at a cost of $1.8 billion in severance payments and restructuring charges over the past year, a figure nearly five times the $374 million the company paid in restructuring costs the previous financial year.
What Oracle is saying
Oracle acknowledged in the report that the downsizing was influenced by the deployment of AI technologies across its operations. It also warned that more layoffs may happen in the future.
- “The adoption and deployment of AI technologies across our operations have resulted, and may continue to result, in reductions to our workforce,” the company said
- “These types of restructurings have resulted, and may in the future result, in increased restructuring costs and reduced productivity,” it added.
The company said its restructuring efforts “can be disruptive” and warned that the reorganisation may result in a shortage of skilled workers in certain roles, leading to a loss of productivity that could affect its earnings.
Oracle disclosed that the full scale of the layoffs had not been publicly confirmed until the annual report was filed, though senior employees had been posting online about “significant” job cuts as far back as April.
More insights
Oracle’s workforce reduction reflects a broader pattern playing out across the global technology industry, where companies are cutting staff while spending hundreds of billions of dollars building AI infrastructure including data centres and computing capacity.
Amazon and Meta have also cut thousands of jobs in recent months as both companies accelerate heavy investment in AI.
More than 100,000 technology workers have been laid off in the past year, according to estimates from employment tracking firms, with AI-driven restructuring now a consistent thread across the sector’s largest employers, BBC reports.
What you should know
Oracle is not the only global tech giant making job cuts amid AI adoption.
Earlier this year, Nairametrics reported that Meta, the parent company of Facebook, had begun informing employees worldwide of a fresh round of layoffs that will affect roughly 8,000 positions, as the tech giant reshaped its workforce to support its growing artificial intelligence ambitions and improve operational efficiency.
The workforce reduction is part of Meta’s broader strategy to streamline its business while investing heavily in AI infrastructure, research, and product development.
