Sony Slices Jobs, Moves HQ to Atlanta
posted Thursday Nov 19, 2009 by Nicholas DiMeo
Looks like Sony Ericsson is planning another string of job cuts in the next year. The culprit, struggling sales. After already eliminating nearly 400 jobs, another 1,600 employees will be unemployed by August 2010.
The company plans to close offices from Seattle, to Miami, to Sweden and even India. Sony announced that their work force would be cut by 20 percent in April of this year and we are seeing this to be the case.
With the relocation of research and development offices and the closing of up to five offices worldwide, along with consolidating operations, the company hopes to increase sales. Many Sony Ericsson locations will be closed in the upcoming months and moved the Atlanta, where the U.S. headquarters is based. The research and development facility will also have a new home, in Redwood Shores, California, from its previous home in North Carolina.
Karen Morris, vice president of marketing for the North American region, said "Atlanta was chosen for the headquarters because of its proximity to major operations of AT&T, one of the company's largest customers and because of the international airport connections available through Atlanta's hub." With sales down 40 percent in the third quarter, Sony Ericsson hopes the move will allow sales to pick back up.
