Toshiba to cut 20,000 jobs, reports say

Associated Press

TOKYO — Electronics giants Toshiba Corp. and Hitachi Ltd. are planning large-scale job cuts amid slumping global demand for information technology, news reports said Saturday.

Toshiba will slash 20,000 jobs, including mid-level executive positions, and is considering achieving the reductions through firings overseas and transfers and early retirements in Japan, the nationally circulated Asahi said in its morning edition.

The reported cutbacks follows previous layoffs, including a reduction of 8,500 jobs last year, the paper said. The Asahi quoted a Toshiba official it did not identify as saying that an unprecedented slump in demand for semiconductors required the company to consider even further cuts.

Public broadcaster NHK television said about 14,000 of the reductions at Toshiba were slated for facilities in Japan and would account for approximately 10 percent of the company's domestic work force. It said all the cuts would be carried out over the next two years.

The Nihon Keizai business daily said Toshiba's cuts in Japan would exceed 10,000.

The Asahi didn't give a figure for how many jobs Hitachi would reduce, but said they would be part of a large-scale restructuring.

Toshiba employs about 190,000 workers while Hitachi has 340,000, the Asahi said. The Asahi said the companies will announce their plans soon, with Toshiba doing so by the end of August.

Earlier this week, Fujitsu Ltd., Japan's largest computer maker, announced plans to slash 16,400 jobs, or 9 percent of its work force, in a bid to stem red ink amid the worldwide electronics slump.

Late last month, NEC Corp. said it would cut 4,000 jobs by next March in an effort to turn around its computer-chip division.