Nokia global layoffs spread to China: Dongguan factory dismisses nearly hundred people

Dongguan factory has dismissed nearly hundred people, before the Beijing-Shanghai and other land has been downsizing and restructuring

Nokia's global layoffs have spread to Chinese factories. Yesterday Yangcheng Evening News reporter from Nokia China confirmed that last month, the company's Dongguan factory has focused on the dismissal of nearly hundred people, and said the move "is intended to improve the efficiency of the plant is part of the group's core strategic push." Before the factory in Dongguan, Nokia China has carried out a series of layoffs and reorganizations in Beijing, Shanghai and Chengdu. According to public information, Nokia's new round of layoffs, announced in June this year, is aimed at completing 10,000 layoffs by the end of 2013, as well as shutting down parts of Europe's factories and planning to save 1.6 billion euros in production costs by 2016 years.

Nokia's first layoffs in Dongguan

Nokia China's PR director Gao Xiang told Yangcheng Evening News yesterday that the factory in Dongguan has dismissed some of its employees in the implementation of Nokia's global strategic integration plan for June this year, with a total of about 6000 people in Dongguan factory and 100 layoffs. He also said that after the restructuring of the staff, the Dongguan factory will also focus on the production of functional machines, facing the Chinese region and overseas markets. It is also reported that this round of layoffs in the last year's strategic transition program Nokia has been basically determined.

Nokia has not disclosed what line of business the Dongguan job cuts will involve, but news has revealed that this is the first time since its inception in 1995, the company has focused on layoffs. This year, Nokia China's research and development, sales, administration and other departments, have undergone personnel changes. A recent departure from Nokia said the company's global market-related departments are laying off workers, with a 50% per cent cut in China of nearly 250 people. Feng Guangshun, the former consulting director of China, also left the company around July.

Nokia China also said in the middle of this year that Nokia's original 4 sales regions would be merged into two districts, removing the East China region in Shanghai and South West District in Chengdu, respectively, into the Beijing-centric north and Guangzhou-centric southern districts. But intriguing is, Yangcheng Evening News reporter learned that, just during the summer vacation, Nokia Southern Teng general manager has left Nokia to take refuge in Samsung.

Nokia China Business Bleak

The relevant people told reporters that Nokia originally had a total of 10 mobile phone factories, Dongguan, Nokia specializes in the production of traditional mobile phones, and has now closed 3 of the remaining 7, of which the Finnish factory in the Nokia headquarters has been closed. Gao said that the company has gradually shifted Europe's production capacity to the Asian market, the Asia-Pacific region now occupies 4 factories, China has two, one in Beijing, a in Dongguan. "This is enough to see that Nokia is very important to the Chinese market."

But from the data, Nokia's performance in China has been unsatisfactory. The company's second-quarter results report showed a 30% drop in handset sales in the Chinese market. In the first quarter of this year, Nokia's revenue in the Chinese market fell 70%. A third-party data-research firm reported that Nokia had a 9.42% per cent share in the Chinese market this June and ranked fourth in the smartphone market, with a 5.81% per cent market share.

But Gao Xiang is confident of Nokia's strategic transformation, he told the Yangcheng Evening News reporter, Nokia will be in the smartphone, functional mobile phones and location services in three directions, continue to play the advantages of traditional mobile phones, but also focus on the development of smart phones and location services, in order to improve profitability of alienation competition.