Note that "salaries" would include some of the marketing budget too, right? On the other hand, "software development" probably includes non-salary costs like o

Note that "salaries" would include some of the marketing budget too, right? On the other hand, "software development" probably includes non-salary costs like offices, hardware, payroll taxes, and whatnot. Anyway, in terms of comparisons to other companies the usual estimates I've seen put the cost of an employee to the employer at somewhere around 2x salary. So employing 500 good software developers will probably run you at least $100 million. If they're mostly in the Bay Area, probably a good bit more; even starting salaries there are over $100k for strong just-out-of-college hires last I checked.