Microsoft plans to axe 27 jobs at its Redmond and Bellevue sites. The latest cull in Microsoft's Washington offices is expected to hit workers on 1 November, according to the Seattle Times. The software giant had notified the Washington State Employment Security Department about the job cuts. "I can confirm that part of our effort to reduce costs and increase efficiencies involved 27 job eliminations here and in other regions across the country," Microsoft spokesman Lou Gellos told the newspaper. "While job eliminations are always difficult, we are taking these necessary actions to realign our resources against our top priorities." In January Microsoft announced plans to layoff 5,000 staff over the course of 18 months. It's understood that most of those staff cuts have now been completed. The firm currently has an employee headcount of around 92,000 people worldwide. The Register asked Microsoft to provide comment on this story, but at time of publication it hadn't got back to us. ®