Motorola, Inc.’s announced job cuts of 7,000 positions in its personal communications sector on Tuesday, citing continuing deterioration in the mobile handset market. Motorola has cut or outsourced about 16,000 jobs in the last six months.
The reductions will affect all aspects of the business, across all geographies, said Margot Brown, a Motorola spokeswoman. “It’s across the board, engineering, administrative staff,” Brown said. The cuts announced Tuesday would be completed by the end of the second quarter, she said. Motorola has about 120,000 employees.
She would not specify where the affected employees are located beyond saying reductions are being made around the globe. She said additional cost-cutting announcements are on the way from Motorola, but she declined to say whether jobs cuts would be involved.
Motorola will take an unspecified charge against first and second quarter earnings related to the job reductions.
Three weeks ago Motorola Inc. laid off 300 workers from its personal communication sector, pledging to make cuts until it trims US$2 billion from the division’s manufacturing and non-manufacturing operations.
Earlier in February, the company cut 4,000 jobs from its semiconductor unit. In January, the company said cellular phone production at its Harvard, Ill., manufacturing plant would cease, with 2,500 more jobs lost.
About 1,320 Motorola Inc. employees lost their jobs in December as a result of a $1 billion manufacturing alliance with electronics manufacturer Celestica Inc., in which Motorola outsourced the manufacturing of some cellular phone handsets, messaging devices, two-way radio products and accessories. Celestica picked up about 1,550 of the 2,870 positions Motorola eliminated in the deal.
Motorola, based in Schaumburg, Ill., can be reached at http://www.mot.com/.