To Help Retain Engineers, Apple Gives $100K-$200K Bonuses

Apple is paying six-figure "special retention grants" to a handful of hardware and software engineers. Protocol reports:The bonuses, anonymous sources told Bloomberg, are worth between $100,000 and more than $200,000 in restricted stock units that vest over several years, providing another incentive for engineers to stay at Apple... The bonuses show the level of insecurity that some of the top-paying companies in the industry feel in this tight market for tech talent. (Even Google employees are feeling unhappy with their compensation....) Apple and other tech giants are throwing more and more money at employees to retain them. In the last few months, Alphabet has adopted a new cash bonus plan that allows employee bonuses "of nearly any size for nearly any reason," The Wall Street Journal reported last month, and Amazon has raised its cash-pay cap from $160,000 to $350,000, according to The New York Times. Bloomberg points out Apple "has suffered some attrition in its chip design group," as Facebook's parent Meta Platforms "has stepped up recruiting of engineers - aiming to put them to work on the so-called metaverse," and the payouts also went to Apple employees working on virtual and augmented reality headsets.Inflation also has put pressure on employers to boost compensation. And Apple is preparing for a return to the office - a source of tension for some employees. By May, the company will require engineers and other corporate staff to work out of the office at least three days a week. So the bonuses "are designed to keep the employees from leaving by vesting over several years," Bloomberg concludes, "and they could become more valuable over time if Apple's stock price continues to rise. "The shares are up more than 40% over the past 12 months..."

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