Carnegie Mellon University announced 75 staff reductions at its Software Engineering Institute, attributing the cuts to the institute’s fiscal structure as a federally funded research and development center and to shifting federal research priorities. The job losses amount to roughly 10% of SEI’s workforce and follow signs of a national slowdown in new federal research awards. University leaders said the broader CMU campus remains financially stable for the fiscal year but is tightening expenses—pausing raises, limiting hiring and reducing nonessential spending. CMU officials linked the SEI reductions directly to contracting federal awards and the difficulty of reallocating fixed costs within the institute’s budget model. The SEI is a major federal contractor in software engineering, cybersecurity and AI engineering research; the cuts signal how federal retrenchment in research spending is translating into staff reductions at university-affiliated research centers.