AUSTIN, Texas, March 6, 2026, 04:30 CST
- Oracle is planning thousands of job cuts, a Bloomberg News report said; Oracle declined to comment
- Investors are watching whether heavy AI data-center spending forces more fundraising ahead of quarterly results
- Oracle also rolled out a new AI safety tool for construction firms this week
Oracle is planning thousands of job cuts as it faces a cash crunch tied to a massive artificial intelligence data center expansion, Bloomberg News reported on Thursday. Oracle declined to comment when contacted by Reuters. 1
The cuts land as Wall Street keeps a close eye on how Oracle pays for the build-out needed to serve customers like OpenAI, and to keep pace in cloud computing with bigger rivals such as Microsoft and Amazon. In February, Oracle said it expected to raise $45 billion to $50 billion in 2026 through a mix of stock sales and debt. 2
Spending is the friction point. In December, Oracle executives said capital expenditures — money spent on long-lived assets such as data centers — would run $15 billion above the $35 billion estimate the company gave earlier in its fiscal year. “The ramp in capex and unclear debt needs are causing uncertainty among investors,” said Melissa Otto, head of research at S&P Global’s Visible Alpha. 3
Bloomberg said the layoffs would hit divisions across the company and could be implemented as soon as this month. Some cuts would target job categories Oracle expects to shrink because of AI, the report said.
Bloomberg also reported Oracle told staff this week it was reviewing open job listings in its cloud division, effectively slowing down or freezing parts of hiring.
Oracle had about 162,000 full-time employees as of May 31, 2025, according to its annual filing cited by Reuters.
Even as it trims headcount, Oracle has been pushing new AI products into its industry software lines. On Thursday, it announced the general availability of an AI-enabled safety forecasting product for construction firms and said it was trained on data spanning the equivalent of more than 10,000 project-years. “Advisor for Safety marks a significant step forward in safety management,” said Mark Webster, a senior vice president and general manager at Oracle Infrastructure Industries. 4
Power, not just chips, is showing up in the conversation. On Wednesday, Oracle joined Google, Microsoft, Amazon and others at the White House to sign a pledge on covering some costs tied to new electricity supplies for data centers. “The real problem is the inability to get generation online fast enough to meet the data center demand,” said Jon Gordon, a director at Advanced Energy United. 5
Oracle shares last traded at about $154.79, up 1.59%, according to Reuters data. 6
Oracle is due to report third-quarter results on Tuesday. Investors will be listening for any shift in the company’s spending plans, cash flow and the pace of data center additions.
But the job cuts may not solve the core math if data center outlays keep rising or if big customers delay workloads. A sharper slowdown in demand for rented computing power could leave Oracle carrying the cost of new capacity longer than expected, while trying to keep service levels steady with fewer staff.
