Bonus: Microsoft's surprise retirement offer — breaking it down on KIRO Newsradio
GeekWire
GeekWire
4.8 • 127 Ratings
🗓️ 24 April 2026
⏱️ 16 minutes
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Summary
Microsoft is offering a voluntary retirement program for the first time in its history, with thousands of U.S. employees eligible. GeekWire's Todd Bishop joins KIRO Newsradio hosts Angela Poe Russell and Mike Lewis to break down the details, what makes this so unusual in the tech industry, and what it says about the company's approach to managing costs in the AI era.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Happy Friday and welcome to Geekwire. It's Todd Bishop with a special bonus episode for you. |
| 0:06.6 | Microsoft delivered a surprise on Thursday, a voluntary retirement program, the first in the |
| 0:13.5 | company's history. I went on Cairo News Radio to talk about the news with hosts Angela Poe Russell |
| 0:19.7 | and Mike Lewis, |
| 0:24.1 | and the conversation went in some interesting directions, |
| 0:29.0 | from Wall Street to AI to what this might mean for the rest of the tech industry, |
| 0:31.1 | and I thought you all might enjoy it. |
| 0:36.5 | Coming up this weekend, we'll be featuring a conversation with atime tech leader who just released his first |
| 0:38.3 | science fiction novel, envisioning a future shaped by the collapse of a global AI system. |
| 0:45.1 | Imagine that. |
| 0:46.6 | Stay tuned for that this weekend, but in the meantime, here's the radio segment. |
| 0:50.7 | You're listening to Cairo News Radio, Northwest News. |
| 1:01.1 | Okay, we are, it's Friday's Eve, right? It's Friday's Eve. |
| 1:04.8 | I'm Angela Poe Russell, along with Mike Lewis. We are filling in for John Curley today on the John Curley show. |
| 1:13.6 | We are glad to have you with us. |
| 1:15.6 | Kicking off this hour, we're talking about Microsoft. |
| 1:18.7 | They've been in the news a lot in the last year related to building up AI and layoffs, |
| 1:23.8 | but this is a little different, a twist. |
| 1:26.1 | It's a weird one. |
| 1:27.0 | This is actually one of the kind of oddly most surprising stories of the day. |
| 1:32.5 | We have on with us. |
| 1:34.3 | I'll get to him in just a minute. |
... |
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