Storage vendor EMC Corp. will lay off approximately 1,300 of its 17,000 employees worldwide as weak IT spending forces its third-quarter results down, the company said in a statement late Thursday.
EMC will not return to profitability as expected for the second half of the year, with the IT spending environment deteriorating further at the end of September, EMC President and Chief Executive Officer Joe Tucci said in the statement.
“The IT spending environment continues to be brutal,” Tucci said in the statement. “The harsh reality of reduced budgets and the uncertainty of the economic and geopolitical climate are weighing heavily on business confidence, causing key projects and the corresponding IT spend to be delayed. We saw no significant change in the competitive environment during the quarter. We don’t know when IT spending growth will resume.”
EMC, which will announce complete third-quarter results in a fortnight’s time, expects to post a loss of US$0.02 per share on revenue for the quarter of US$1.25 billion, marginally up on the US$1.21 billion recorded in the third quarter last year.