Nokia Oyj workers are bracing for what may be the steepest job cuts in almost two decades as the world’s largest maker of mobile phones prepares to start a partnership with Microsoft Corp.
A reduction in research and development activities is set to be announced by the end of the month, with as many as 6,000 jobs under threat, said Antti Rinne of Pro, Finland’s biggest private-sector office-worker union. That would be equivalent to 38 per cent of the Finnish company’s global devices R&D workforce. Nokia declined to comment on the numbers.
Chief Executive Officer Stephen Elop said on February 11 that Nokia will adopt Microsoft’s Windows Phone 7 as its main smartphone operating system over the next two years, a move triggering “substantial reductions in employment.” As he phases out Nokia’s homegrown Symbian and MeeGo systems, workers haven’t been told who may hang onto their jobs.
“This doesn’t make for very efficient or creative working conditions,” said Kalle Kiili, an engineer in Tampere, a research site that employs 3,000 workers, and represents the YTN union. “This waiting is expensive and we’ve already had a reorganisation of R&D in 2009 and another reorganization of Symbian in the second half of 2010, just as the organisation was starting to work properly again.”
