In what could be the single-largest round of job-cuts in Motorola history, the Chicago Tribune has confirmed that the ailing mobile phone manufacturer will indeed be giving some 4,000 employees the dreaded pink slip. Previous speculation that had Motorola slashing their workforce by as much as 50% has come to a head with today’s confirmation of upcoming lay-offs.
Motorola will be trimming staff levels across all divisions, of which the handset division (which, after all, is the root of Motorola’s current financial woes) will take the hardest hit. The mobile phone manufacturing arm of Motorola will see a staggering 3,000 employees let go over the course of 2009.
Motorola is apparently concentrating on cutting costs and moving their smartphone devices to the open-source Android platform. The company recently beefed up its Android-development team and announced that it would shift its focus to the Google-made mobile OS. Unfortunately, that means jobs across other platforms and device-types will no longer be needed.
Still, Motorola has big things planned for 2009. The company’s thinned-out and hopefully more efficient handset division has a lot riding on their shoulders, we’ll see if they’re up to the task.
[Via: BGR]