Sony’s current Ericsson based clear-out has struck hard to the good folks in Sweden as Sony has announced that it will be moving its entire Sony Mobile area of eth business out of Sweden and to Tokyo, Japan making 1000 people redundant in the process.
When Sony bought out the Ericsson side of the Sony Ericsson business earlier in the year is starting to make the operational changes in the aim to become a more profitable. Unfortunately for the Swedish workers this means reducing their global Headcount and moving the headquarters from Lund, Sweden to Tokyo, Japan in October.
The reduction in 15% of the global headcount will equate to roughly 650 of the job losses at the Swedish operations and the remainder of the 1000 will be Sweden-based consultants.
The staff redundancies will be rolled out gradually over the next year and a half, to be concluded by March 2014. In discussing the planned changes, Kunimasa Suzuki, the President and CEO of Sony Mobile, had this to say:
“We are accelerating the integration and convergence with the wider Sony group to continue enhancing our offerings, and a more focused and efficient operational structure will help to reduce Sony Mobile’s costs, enhance time to market efficiency and bring the business back to a place of strength.
Whilst its ad to hear of any major Jobs losses this move is a proactive one from Sony to make the business more profitable and to save the Smartphone brand which was suffering under the Sony Ericsson ownership.
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Sony Mobile Communications Announces New Operational Structure and Reduction in Workforce
LONDON, August 23, 2012 /PRNewswire/ — Sony Mobile Communications AB (“Sony Mobile”) today announced that it is altering the global operational structure of its development sites in Tokyo, Japan, Lund, Sweden and Beijing, China. In October 2012, Sony Mobile will move its corporate headquarters and certain other functions from Lund, Sweden, to Tokyo, Japan. Sony Mobile has also redefined the roles and responsibilities of each major development site to leverage the strengths of each respective site. These measures aim to enhance operational and development capabilities of Sony Mobile such as time to market efficiency, streamline supply chain management and drive greater integration with the wider Sony group.
“Sony has identified the mobile business as one of its core businesses and the Xperia™ smartphone portfolio continues to gain momentum with customers and consumers worldwide,” said Kunimasa Suzuki, President and CEO of Sony Mobile. “We are accelerating the integration and convergence with the wider Sony group to continue enhancing our offerings, and a more focused and efficient operational structure will help to reduce Sony Mobile’s costs, enhance time to market efficiency and bring the business back to a place of strength.”
In relation to the operational structure changes, Sony Mobile plans to reduce its global headcount by approximately 15 percent (approximately 1000 personnel, including consultants) throughout the financial years of 2012 and 2013 (i.e. by the end of March 2014) as the company seeks to increase operational efficiency, reduce costs and drive profitable growth.
Today Sony Mobile filed a redundancy notification (“varsel”) with the Swedish authorities to notify them that the company expects around 650 employees across a number of functions at Sony Mobile in Lund to be affected by job closures. The remaining headcount reductions will be primarily consultants in Sweden. Lund will continue to be an important strategic site for Sony Mobile, with the main focus on software and application development.
Sony Mobile is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sony Corporation, following Sony Corporation’s acquisition of Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson’s 50% stake in Sony Ericsson Mobile Communications AB, completed on February 15, 2012.
“Sony” is a trademark of Sony Corporation. “Xperia” is a trademark of Sony Mobile Communications. All other trademarks or registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners.
For more information, images and videos please visit: pressreleases.sonymobile.com
Sony Mobile Communications, Global Communications & PR departmen
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