Atlassian billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes has slashed more than 1,600 jobs as artificial intelligence reshapes the workforce.
Cannon-Brookes said AI had impacted ‘the mix of skills we need’ and ‘the number of roles required in certain areas.’
About 30 per cent of the impacted employees are based in Australia.
Atlassian stock has tumbled 50 per cent since the start of 2026 and is now down 66 per cent year-on-year as investors fear artificial intelligence could shrink corporate workforces – and demand for workplace software.
The company soared to a US$162 billion valuation in 2021 during the Covid-19 work-from-home tech boom, but its market cap has since slumped to about US$19.90 billion.
Atlassian earns much of its revenue by charging companies per user.
If businesses can use AI to do the work of 10 employees with just two staff, they may only need two licences instead of 10, potentially slashing revenue from that customer by up to 80 per cent.
Newer AI agents can also complete multi-step tasks such as researching a problem, writing code to solve it, testing the result and refining it without constant human input.
Atlassian billionaire Mike Cannon-Brookes (pictured) has slashed more than 1,600 jobs as artificial intelligence reshapes the workforce
Annie Cannon-Brookes and Mike Cannon-Brookes in happier times
Investors fear that if AI allows large companies to operate with smaller teams, demand for many workplace software such as those offered by Atlassian could slow across the tech sector, dragging down company valuations.
As his company faces growing market pressure, Cannon-Brookes is also navigating a complex divorce from his ex-wife Annie after they split in July 2023.
Beyond Atlassian shares, the couple’s reported asset pool totals about $10 billion, including a property portfolio valued at roughly $360 million.
Some of those holdings include high-profile sporting investments. Cannon-Brookes became the youngest current owner of a US NBA franchise in 2020 after spending hundreds of millions to become co-owner of the Utah Jazz.
In 2021, he also acquired a 25 per cent stake in NRL club the South Sydney Rabbitohs.
Neither Cannon-Brookes nor his wife have publicly commented on the breakdown of their relationship or how their shared investments will ultimately be divided.
Despite the market and marriage turmoil, Cannon-Brookes insisted Atlassian was building a ‘f****** great business’ during a quarterly earnings investor meeting earlier this year.
But in the month leading up to the results, he continued selling roughly 7,665 shares a day, at prices ranging from US$161.11 per share on January 8 to US$105.14 by February 4.
‘I’m convinced AI is great for Atlassian. Others think software is dead,’ Cannon-Brookes told shareholders.
‘In this environment it seems that noise swamps signal, nuance gets lost.
‘AI is the most important technology of our generation.
‘And you’ve heard me say AI is the best thing to happen to Atlassian. At the same time you’ve probably heard a lot of people say SaaS (software-as-a-service) is over, and software is dead.
‘Well I want to take the opportunity to share a few thoughts about why AI is great for Atlassian… For most people AI becomes most valuable when it shows up inside the workflows, business processes and applications that they run their business on, or choose to run their business on, and that’s exactly what we’re doing today.’
Last month, Atlassian has paused hiring across engineering roles, with some candidates saying offers were withdrawn and others claiming communication stopped entirely.
‘Got an [engineering] offer … After three weeks of silence I finally messaged the hiring manager on LinkedIn. They told me it’s a hiring freezing [sic],’ one person posted on employee forum Blind.
‘Same, my interview in 6 hours was just cancelled and all I was told was the position is no longer available. Very frustrating as I’ve been prepping for weeks,’ another post from last week reads.
Cannon-Brookes came under fire last year for buying an emissions-belching Bombardier 7500 jet -valued between $75million and $80million – despite being an avid climate change campaigner.
Cannon-Brookes admitted he had a ‘deep internal conflict’ about purchasing the plane, but ultimately decided his interests trumped those of the environment.
‘There’s a couple of reasons I’ve purchased a plane. Personal security is the primary reason … but also so I can run a global business from Australia, and still be a constantly present dad,’ he said.
‘So, this is a hard, continual trade-off I’ve decided to make.’
A single private jet emits as much carbon dioxide in an hour as the average person does in an entire year, with private flights 14 times more polluting (per passenger) than a commercial plane.
‘I’m still pretty damn focused on making an impact at a large scale, removing huge volumes of emissions through active investments and philanthropy,’ he said.
Cannon-Brookes previously warned the world needs to change its eating habits by adding insects to its daily diet if the planet is to feed a global population of eight billion.
‘Insects are a huge part of a sustainable future,’ he said.
‘I’m a big fan of cricket flour and insect eating in general. The logic totally stacks up – Low planet footprint, high protein, sustainable etc.
‘Always looking for interesting opportunities in that space!’
Cannon-Brookes believes Australia could be the ‘Saudi Arabia of renewable electricity’ if the political will was there.
He added: ‘We could power the entire world five times over from the Australian sun that we have.
‘It’s a good measure of how large our country is, and how much great sun we have. We have a country almost designed to benefit most from the renewable boom.
‘And we have 3 billion consumers nearby who can take our sunlight when we ship it up to Asia. We absolutely can be a renewable energy superpower.’
As part of his climate change agenda, Cannon-Brookes became AGL’s largest shareholder in 2022, purchasing an 11 per cent stake to pressure the company into accelerating its move to renewable energy.
He used his influence to block AGL’s proposed demerger, which would have extended the life of its coal-fired power plants, and publicly called AGL ‘one of the most toxic companies on the planet’ due to its high carbon dioxide emissions.
