Family of Late Microsoft Engineer Found Dead at Workplace Urges Company to End Employee Overwork
The family of a 35-year-old Microsoft engineer who died while at work is calling on Silicon Valley companies to end the culture of overworking employees.
Pratik Pandey, of Menlo Park, California, checked into Microsoft’s Mountain View office at 7:50 p.m. on August 19 and was later found face-down in the campus courtyard around 2 a.m., his uncle, Manoj Pandey, told the Palo Alto Daily Post.
According to Satish Chandra, an IT professional and Santa Clara community leader running for city council, a preliminary report from the Santa Clara County Medical Examiner suggested Pandey likely died of a heart attack.
Though he had no known health conditions, Pandey had confided in his roommate and colleagues that he was under intense stress, managing several projects simultaneously, Chandra noted.
His uncle has since urged tech companies to monitor employees working late hours and implement measures to ease workplace stress and anxiety.
“That will probably save a life,” he said. “It’s a lot of pain for the family when a loved one passes away.”
Police officers found “no signs of any suspicious activity or behavior” at the scene, and the death is not being treated as a criminal investigation, according to the Mountain View Police Department.
Pandey was known to frequently work late into the night. He was a hard-working young man, with a love for soccer, ping pong and cricket, his uncle said.
“Overall, a very positive person,” he added.
Pandey was born in Indore, India, and immigrated to the US about a decade ago to earn his master’s degree from San Jose State University.
He worked as a software engineer at Apple, Illumina, and Walmart Labs before landing a job at Microsoft in July 2020. He worked on Microsoft’s Fabric product, a data analytics platform.
Pandey’s uncle told the Palo Alto Daily Post that the family is sending his remains to India, where the young engineer’s parents and two sisters live.
