Microsoft’s £163k wages

STAFF at Microsoft’s UK arm were paid an average of £163,000 each last year.

The tech firm employs 3,024 staff in Britain and its wages bill for the year to June 30 was £369.3m, or around £122,000 each.

On top of this, the tech giant also handed staff 1,046,542 shares, worth an extra £41,000 each on average. It comes after Google revealed its UK staff each took home an average of about £226,000 last year.

Microsoft’s UK business reported an 81pc rise in sales to £2.1bn, with profits rising 29.7pc to £137.5m. But its tax bill fell, from £29.1m to £28.2m.