from the inside Reporting That Microsoft’s Alex Kipman, who led the teams that developed the company’s augmented reality headset HoloLens and the Kinect motion controller for Xbox and serves as one of Microsoft’s senior technical colleagues, has resigned after allegations of verbal abuse and sexual harassment.
Microsoft will not immediately confirm or deny the report, but Jake Wire He already supported it By getting an internal email from Microsoft cloud head, Scott Guthrie: “We have mutually decided that this is the right time for him to leave the company to pursue other opportunities,” he wrote. The note you can read on Jake Wire, says nothing about the allegations, and says Kipman will be staying for another two months to help with the transition. It also details the reorganization of Kipman’s entire mixed reality department, with hardware teams joining in Panos Banay Windows Hardware Foundation +.
according to insiderss, more than 25 Microsoft employees contributed to an internal report about alleged misconduct by Kipman, including instances of unwanted touching, plus he once watched an obscene VR video in front of employees in the office.
Today’s report comes next for precedent from the inside May 25th reportDozens of employees told the publication about Kipman’s alleged behavior. Three employees said from the inside That they were warned not to leave women alone around Kipman. When from the inside Accessed at the time, Microsoft has neither confirmed nor denied specific allegations of misconduct against women, but denied that Kipman had begun accompanying HR staff to meetings.
One former Microsoft executive was so upset about Kipman’s behavior that he suggested the COVID-19 outbreak had actually made things better: “The best thing that happened, unfortunately, was the pandemic,” they told Insider. “So we never had to interact with him in person.”
Kipman did not respond to from the insideHis repeated requests for comment and he has not tweeted since May 23.
In February, Kipman responded to an earlier question from the inside Report that It was suggested that the HoloLens division was in disarray, and that HoloLens 3 may have been scrapped“Don’t believe what you read on the Internet,” he said. Insider wasn’t the only post mentioning some problems with the split, though: The Wall Street Journal mentioned In January, more than 70 Microsoft employees on the HoloLens team left the company in 2021, and more than 40 employees joined Meta.
Microsoft was counting on a big win for HoloLens with the US military, that ordered up to 120,000 IVAS headphones for soldiers. This would be worth $21.88 billion for the company over 10 years, but the military delayed the deal, and Pentagon audits weren’t optimistic about the idea. “Purchasing an IVAS without gaining user acceptance could waste up to $21.88 billion in taxpayer money to put in place a system that soldiers may not want to use or use as intended,” reads part of the April 2022 report from the Department of Defense Inspector General (PDF). However, Guthrie states in his memo that the military had already approved an operational test last month.
Regardless of the status of the Hololens program, Kipman is out.
Microsoft will not comment on a file from the inside Report.