Sony has axed 8,000 jobs, or 4 percent, of its entire work force around the world in order to make savings worth US$1.1 billion a year because of the global economic crisis and a stronger yen that batters profits for the PlayStation 3 maker. Employing 185,000 people, the layoffs will be completed by the end of March of 2010.
It is unknown which country will receive most of the cuts, nor the country breakdown, but the company has said that most of the cuts will come from the electronics division, which employs 160,000 people.
The stronger yen has seen many Japanese companies announcing several job cuts, as many make most of their profits from overseas sales; and 80% of worldwide sales contribute to Sony’s earnings. Sony has also announced that it will cut production and lower inventory numbers because of less demand for its products.
It has also postponed its investment in boosting its production in LCD TVs in Slovakia; close several plants, including one located in France that is used to make tapes and other recording media, reducing it by 10 percent from the current number of 57 plants; trim spending in semiconductors; and outsource a portion of its plan to build image sensors for mobile phones.
[...] as well, like the past few months, we had a couple of layoffs from Sony and Gawker Media (again), and Yahoo this month starting axing several jobs after previously [...]