Oracle's Mass Layoffs Spark Controversy as Workers Push Back

On March 31, Oracle delivered a shock to its workforce by laying off an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 people via email. One of the affected employees shared their experience with TechCrunch: “I had this weird feeling in my stomach. I tried signing into the company’s virtual private network (VPN), but it said ‘this user doesn’t exist anymore.’ Then I called a friend and asked if they could see me on Slack, and she replied that my account was deactivated.”

The employee soon received an email stating their role had been terminated immediately. The severance offer arrived a few days later, but the terms were far from ideal for many laid-off employees.

Oracle offered standard Corporate America severance packages: four weeks of pay for the first year, plus one additional week per year of service, capped at 26 weeks. The company also covered one month of COBRA insurance. However, there were significant catches that made these terms less attractive.

Stock compensation often makes up a large portion of tech workers' pay, particularly at Oracle. But the company did not accelerate soon-to-vest restricted stock units (RSUs). Any shares that hadn’t vested by the termination date were forfeited, even for stock granted as retention incentives or in place of salary increases tied to promotions.

One long-tenured employee lost $1 million in stock that was just four months from vesting. RSUs made up about 70% of his compensation, according to Time.

In addition, some employees discovered they were classified as remote workers by the company and didn’t qualify for WARN Act protections because they worked near an office on a hybrid schedule. Even if they were covered by the WARN Act, this did not necessarily extend severance, the former Oracle employee said.

For a brief period, a group of employees tried to negotiate en masse with Oracle. At least 90 people signed a public petition urging the database and cloud computing giant to match the terms offered by other big tech companies conducting mass layoffs in the name of AI. Meta’s severance package started at 16 weeks of base pay, plus two weeks for every year of employment, and covered COBRA for 18 months. Microsoft provided accelerated stock vesting, a minimum of eight weeks’ pay, and an additional one to two weeks for every six months of service, depending on rank. Cloudflare offered lump sum severance equivalent to base pay through the end of 2026, plus healthcare coverage through the end of the year, and accelerated vesting of stock through August 15.

Oracle declined to negotiate, according to an email seen by TechCrunch. The company’s response underscores that tech workers have few protections when it isn’t an employees’ market, despite the high pay and perks they enjoy during good times.