Microsoft's Xbox division may usher in one of the largest rounds of layoffs in its history under new leadership in the name of "business restructuring." SneakerSO, a well-known industry whistleblower, posted on the NeoGAF forum that Xbox's recent high-level personnel changes may cause the department to usher in one of the largest rounds of layoffs in history under the name of "business restructuring" under the new leadership.
According to him, this matter "stuck a fatal blow" to Xbox's hardware planning, because there is no worse situation for the Xbox department than leaving it to Asha Sharma, the former product president of Microsoft's core AI division.
The whistleblower further stated that the departure of former Xbox president Sarah Bond is an important signal of changes taking place behind the scenes in the department. According to it, Bond is essentially a direct descendant of former Microsoft Gaming CEO Phil Spencer. Spencer has been in charge of the Xbox division since 2014 and became CEO of Microsoft Games in 2022 until his official retirement recently.
Asha Sharma, the newly appointed CEO of Microsoft Games, is a firm supporter of AI and even believes that AI is a good solution to the continued decline in fertility rates. As early as in an interview in August 2025, she shared her vision for this technology, saying: "I will even wonder, will my son still have classmates in the future? The root cause is that the fertility rate is declining, isn't it?" She pointed out, "In the 1990s when we grew up, the average fertility rate was about 3, and now it has dropped to 2.3. It is expected that by 2050, this number will fall below the population replacement level."
Sharma does not see AI as a disruptive force that will replace humans, but rather as a tool that can help reverse this demographic trend. She gave an example of a hospital in London that "uses AI to match eggs and sperm, which not only improves the success rate of conception, but also reduces treatment costs." She believes that such technological breakthroughs are enough to prove that AI can expand the accessibility of fertility treatments and improve the effectiveness of treatments.