Scattered layoffs in IBM can touch 4,600: report

Technology giant IBM is resorting to "scattered layoffs" and the total could be nearly 4,600 employees in North America even though the company has reported surprisingly strong quarterly profits in January, a media report says.

"Big companies also routinely carry out scattered layoffs that are small enough to stay under the radar... And IBM is one such company," the New York Times said.

Interestingly, after reporting strong quarterly profits in January, its Chief Executive Samuel J Palmisano in an e-mail message to employees said that while other companies were reducing jobs, his company would not. "Most importantly, we will invest in our people," he wrote.

But the next day, the New York Times said, "More than 1,400 employees in IBM's sales and distribution division in the United States and Canada were told their jobs would be eliminated in a month. More cuts followed, and overall, IBM has told about 4,600 North American employees in recent weeks that their jobs are vanishing."

Quoting J Randall MacDonald, IBM's senior vice-president for human resources, the newspaper said, "It was routine for the company to lay off some employees while hiring elsewhere."