Nokia to lay off hundreds of employees

NOKIA, the world’s biggest manufacturer of mobile phones, plans to lay off about 500 employees as well as scale down operations in a number of sites around the world.

The affected sites are Jyväskylä AND Salo in Finland, where the operation will affect 320 and 90 employees respectively.

The company said such moves were part of broader plans to increase cost-efficiency in the wake of the current global economic turmoil.

“Our employees in Jyväskylä are highly competent and have contributed to the creation of numerous hit products. The planned closure of the Jyväskylä site is an unfortunate, yet unavoidable measure. We must adjust our resources to reflect reduced market demand in order to maintain our competitiveness also in the future,” said Peter Røpke, Senior Vice President, Devices, Nokia.

Juha Putkiranta, Senior Vice President, Demand Supply Network Management, Nokia, said scaling down operations in Salo was prompted by reduced market demand.

“With these plans, we aim to scale down Salo production to reflect reduced market demand, while operations in the factory continue uninterrupted. This is one of the measures we are taking to adjust our global demand supply network to the current situation.”

Nokia said it will begin consultations with employee representatives about these plans to lay off the workers.

Mthulisi Sibanda