Microsoft is reportedly preparing to cut thousands of jobs, many of them at its Nokia handset business. The software giant recently bought the Nokia unit for $7.2 billion, and reportedly pledged to cut costs when the deal was announced. According to Bloomberg, Microsoft may cut jobs at Nokia as well as at parts of its own business that overlap with Nokia. The number of cuts may exceed the 5,800 jobs Microsoft eliminated in 2009.
The company picked up 30,000 employees with its Nokia acquisition, bringing its total headcount to between 125,000 and 130,000. Marketing and engineering positions are reportedly being targeted for cuts, as is the company’s Xbox division.
Microsoft’s plans for the Nokia handset business are still unclear. Sales of Nokia’s Lumia line of Windows-based smartphones have been disappointing, and now Microsoft has extended Nokia’s Android experiment by launching the second generation Nokia Android smartphone, the Nokia X2.
Android’s dominance in the smartphone space is a reality that Microsoft cannot deny. Stephen Elop, the former Microsoft executive who took the CEO job at Nokia and then returned to Microsoft with Nokia, has said that the Nokia X smartphones are a “Trojan horse” because they get Windows into the hands of Android users. But whether those customers will actually embrace the Windows mobile operating system remains to be seen.
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Microsoft reportedly plans Nokia job cuts
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