New Xbox boss continues leadership overhaul with several former colleagues and AI experts

A continued decline in Xbox's console hardware revenue has spurred changes by new CEO Asha Sharma in a continuation of a large-scale turnover at the company this year.

Sharma is filling out Xbox leadership with several former members of Microsoft's CoreAI team (where Sharma originated from within the company), according to a memo obtained by CNBC today. What this means is that a lot of the head honchos involved at the division formerly known as Microsoft Gaming all now have a large amount of expertise in artificial intelligence, in one way or another.

"We need to evolve how we work and how we are organized across our platform," Sharma wrote in the memo. "Right now, it is too hard to ship impact quickly. We spend too much time inward instead of with the community, and we lack the depth we need in some of the fundamentals."

According to the memo, this new Xbox leadership team will consist of:

• Jared Palmer, VP of Engineering (former CoreAI VP of Product)
• Tim Allen, design lead (former CoreAI VP of Design)
• Jonathan McKay, leader of Xbox growth (former Head of Growth for ChatGPT)
• Evan Chaki (former CoreAI General Manager)

The shake-up also spells out the removal of other people like Roanne Sones (corporate VP of Xbox devices and ecosystem will be "taking a leave of absence") and Kevin Gammill (corporate VP of Xbox user experience will be stepping down), so there's a lot going on behind the scenes.

Xbox has certainly dropped the ball in this generation of consoles, and sales numbers reflect that in recent quarterly earnings reports, with the business down almost across the board. Changes were coming out of necessity, and this is apparently what Sharma has in mind thus far.

"This is an important time for Xbox," the memo said. "Our goal with this change is simple: build a platform that is affordable, personal, and open by staying close to the work and the people we serve. We will continue to add the capabilities needed to get there."

Update on May 5 at 2:40pm CT: Sharma confirmed the above today and released this statement on her Twitter/X account:

"Xbox needs to move faster, deepen our connection with the community, and address friction for both players and developers. Today, we promoted leaders who helped build Xbox, while also bringing in new voices to help push us forward. This balance is important as we get the business back on track. As part of this shift, you’ll see us begin to retire features that don’t align with where we’re headed. We will begin winding down Copilot on mobile and will stop development of Copilot on console."

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