HELSINKI – Finnish telecoms equipment maker Nokia today said it will slash up to 10,000 jobs over the next two years as part of a €600 million (RM2.9 billion) cost-cutting programme.
Announcing the wide-ranging restructuring led by new chief executive Pekka Lundmark, the company said market developments in the next 24 months will determine the exact number of job losses.
“Planned restructuring is expected to result in an 80,000- to 85,000-employee organisation, over an 18- to 24-month period, instead of the approximately 90,000 employees Nokia has today,” it said in a statement.
The firm will also streamline its portfolio and reduce “site fragmentation” in the long term, it added.
Nokia has struggled in the three-way race against Ericsson and Huawei to dominate the super-fast 5G equipment market, losing out on a major Verizon contract in the United States last year and failing to make inroads in China.
After Lundmark took the helm last August, he scrapped previous CEO Rajeev Suri’s “end-to-end solutions” strategy, replacing it with a more focused approach and pledging to “invest whatever it takes to win in 5G”.
The firm announced last month that predicted market share loss in North America in 5G and 4G, along with price erosion, meant that its 2021 outlook remains unchanged, with a 7% to 10% operating margin target.
“In those areas where we choose to compete, we will play to win,” said Lundmark in today’s statement.
Job cuts from Nokia’s previous round of cost-cutting, announced in 2018, are still underway, including the loss of over 1,000 positions in France after its takeover of Alcatel-Lucent.
The Finnish group is due to announce further details of its strategy and long-term financial forecasts on Thursday. – AFP, March 16, 2021
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