Nokia to shed 350 jobs in cost-cutting measures

Nokia on Tuesday announced the company is cutting 350 jobs in Finland to improve the profitability of its operations. The Finnish telecom equipment maker Nokia seeks to find savings worth 700 million euros ($800 million) by next year.

Currently, around 6000 employs are working for Nokia in Finland alone. Head of the company’s Finnish operations, Tommi Uitto told the press, “The planned changes are indispensable to secure Nokia’s long-term competitiveness. These kind of decisions are never easy and we will do our best to support our staff during the transformation process.”

The consultative negotiations with employee representatives will start from 22nd January.

The cost-cutting plan announced in October is believed to be somewhat related to the fact that the adoption of fifth-generation (5G) mobile technologies has progressed slower than anticipated. However, the Finish company denies these theories and claims that these measures are merely a part of a global strategy to consolidate its long-term competitiveness by generating cost reductions of 700 million euros by 2020.

Looking at the bigger picture, the timing of this could not have been more perfect. At a time when Trump has announced to ban Huawei made equipment in the US and in some of its allies, the network industry is all up for grabs for the already network giants- Nokia and Sweden’s Ericsson.