Finnish kit vendor Nokia is going to cut 1,233 jobs at its Alcatel-Lucent subsidiary in France as part of its continued search for profitability.
The story was first reported by Reuters, which notes that a five-year commitment not to cut French jobs, which was a condition of the acquisition being approved, is about to expire. So this is presumably not a coincidence, but it’s not clear whether Nokia always intended to have a purge as soon as it was allowed, or if this move is a response to more immediate concerns, according to Telecoms.com.
The report makes reference to market pressures on costs as a reason for the redundancies, which is ironically a somewhat redundant statement. Why else would a company get rid of a bunch of people? Again, they could be exceptional short-term pressures, or Nokia could have always considered those (largely R&D) positions redundant, but was forced to maintain them for five years aby the French government.
„Following the global cost savings program announcement on October 25, 2018, Nokia is reinforcing its efforts and has earlier launched a global evaluation of its R&D operations that has led to significant adjustments globally. Implementation already started in some countries and the project is now impacting Nokia’s operations in France. The project, which Nokia presented to the European and French Works councils (ALU-I) today, is expected to lead to an estimated reduction of roughly 1,233 positions across R&D and central functions at Nokia’s Paris-Saclay and Lannion sites. The three Nokia France affiliate companies – Radio Frequency Systems (RFS), Nokia Bell Labs France (NBLF) and Alcatel Submarine Networks (ASN) – are not in the scope of the announced project. The planned project is subject to consultations with the Works Council / employee representatives and the final outcome will be known only after the process has been concluded.”, announced a Nokia spokesperson.
