Nokia announces another round of job-cuts; to reduce costs due to weak demand
According to Reuters’ report, the world’s mobile phone bigwig Nokia intends slashing another 450 jobs in its services business, IT support and industry collaboration. The move depicts Nokia’s attempt to reduce costs in the face of the weak demand.
Around 360 workers will be laid off in Nokia’s Internet Services division, as the company folds operations into Ovi Store, which is its content storefront for its May-scheduled mobile devices.
The news of a fresh round of job-cuts at Nokia comes after the company’s earlier this month announcement of a colossal 90 percent nosedive in its year-on-year first quarter net profit figures. With consumers cutting back their expenses and handset sellers looking to clear their stocks, the company plans to substantially reduce the annual costs at its handset division alone by over 700 million euros.
The earlier layoff announcement by Nokia include – the 600 job-cuts announced on November 2008; nearly 400 on February 11, 2009; and 1,700 more job cuts announced on March 17, 2009. In addition, on February 24 this year, Nokia had announced its intentions of offering a severance package to the first 1,000 voluntary retirees worldwide.
The figures of 2008-end reveal that the total workforce of Nokia was 61,500 employees; while its telecom equipment gear division Nokia Siemens Networks (NSN) had a total of 60,300 employees.