Ericsson to cut 5,000 jobs on back of strong quarter
Ericsson said it would cut 5,000 jobs and warned of an unpredictable year ahead after the company beat forecasts by posting stronger than expected results for the fourth quarter.
The Swedish telecoms vendor posted an operating profit of SKr9.2bn (E857m) on sales of Skr67bn (E6.2bn) in Q4, compared to Skr7.6bn (E707.2m) on sales of Skr54.5bn (E5bn) a year earlier.
However, Ericsson's net profit dropped 31% to Skr3.89bn (E362m) due to restructuring costs and lower gross margin. Reflecting a sense of uncertainty, the company said it would step up cost cutting efforts and would not issue a business outlook for 2009.
Ericsson said that 1,000 of the planned job cuts would take place in Sweden, where roughly a quarter of its 78,000 employees are based.
