Nokia to Chop 1 in 5 Jobs

...in its main mobile devices unit
By Kate Seamons,  Newser Staff
Posted Jun 14, 2012 6:52 AM CDT
Nokia to Chop 1 in 5 Jobs
This Feb. 8, 2012 file photo shows the Nokia offices in Salo, Finland.   (AP Photo/Lehtikuva, Jussi Nukari, File)

Even rose-colored glasses can't make Nokia's situation look any brighter. The company today announced that it would cut another 10,000 jobs, which Reuters points out is one out of every five slots at its once-formidable global cellphone business. The news was accompanied by the warning that its main mobile devices unit would post an even bigger operating loss than expected, as Nokia faces competition from Apple and Google that it admits affected it "to a somewhat greater extent than previously expected," reports the Wall Street Journal.

The cuts will be made by the end of 2013, and will add up to $2 billion in cost reductions by the end of that year. The overhaul, CEO Stephen Elop's biggest to date, extends to the top, with the company's CMO and heads of markets and mobile phones to step down by month-end. Bloomberg reports that sites in Finland, Germany, and Canada will also be shuttered, and notes that the stock has hit its lowest price since 1996. Since Elop took over in the fall of 2010, nearly 40,000 jobs have been eliminated; Nokia currently employs 122,000, some 53,000 of which work in its mobile devices unit. (More Nokia stories.)

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