Shell likely to cut 3,600 IT jobs: Report

Royal Dutch Shell Plc may cut as many as 3,600 staff in its information-technology division and hire other companies for the work, the Sunday Telegraph reported today without saying where it got the information.

London-based Shell decided to contract out most of its IT operations, nominating Electronic Data Systems Corp, T-Systems International GmbH and AT&T Inc, the newspaper said.

Shell plans a series of meetings with employees starting January 8 to outline details, according to the report. The plan to allocate the work to other companies is "substantial" and likely to create "uncertainty", said an e-mailed letter signed by Goh Swee Chen, vice president of IT Infrastructure, the newspaper reported.

The letter was posted on an employees' web site and confirmed by Shell as authentic, the Telegraph added.

Shell wants the new IT arrangements to take effect by July 1, the newspaper said.