Amazon, Alphabet and Microsoft each roughly doubled their capital expenditure (capex: spending on data centres, chips and buildings) in the three months to September, in results published on 28 and 29 October, and only two of them reported more staff. Amazon spent $77.3bn on property and equipment against $35.1bn a year earlier, and its workforce rose by 43,000 in the quarter to 1,638,0001. Alphabet spent $51.4bn against $24.0bn and ended September with 204,757 staff, 5,824 more than in June2.
Microsoft's additions to property and equipment rose to $39.4bn from $19.4bn on revenue of $92.3bn, and its 28 October results gave no headcount3. Press reports say it offered voluntary exit packages (severance paid to staff who agree to leave) to about 60,000 staff from 26 October, about 27% of the 223,000 it employed in June, with staff to decide in early December4. Microsoft has filed nothing and has not confirmed the figure.
Meta, which reported on 21 October, cut headcount 15% on the year to 66,775 while spending $34.9bn5. Together the four spent about $203bn in one quarter, more than twice Microsoft's revenue for the same three months. Per employee, Meta spent about $523,000, Alphabet $251,000 and Amazon $47,000. The split the four showed in the summer holds, and Alphabet's gain extends the growth it reported in July.
Amazon's 43,000 are mostly warehouse and delivery workers, so its count says little about office jobs. A large share of the $203bn pays for cloud capacity the companies rent to other firms, so the sum tracks the scale of the AI boom more than any one company's wish to replace its own staff. Meta had the highest spend per head of the four and was the only one to report fewer staff. Meta gave no AI reason for the cut.
