HP to Cut 24,600 Jobs, 8% of Total Workforce

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
From our front-page news:
Times are not good in the financial world, with large investment firms closing shop and even one of the world's largest insurers also scrambling to come up with some $75 billion just to stay afloat. Hewlett-Packard might be feeling the effects of the economy too, but they claim upcoming job cuts are to streamline business and doesn't seem to be the result of the current state of things.

HP recently acquired Electronic Data Systems, which is where most of the job cuts will be. Almost half of the 24,600 will be workers inside the US. The company also adds that half of the positions will be refilled in the future as different jobs within the company, but that won't be quick enough for the folks laid-off.

The biggest areas where the hit will be noticeable is with their finance, human resources and legal departments, where USA Today claims a lot of overlap can occur. But 24,600? Sure doesn't sound like a healthy culling, to say the least.

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Djurdjevic said EDS had been cutting jobs before it was acquired by HP, and that some investors were concerned the cutbacks did not address a key problem for EDS in the need to ink more profitable deals, a challenge that now falls to HP. HP had not previously detailed how many employees of the combined company would lose their jobs. Before the acquisition, HP had 178,000 people and EDS had 142,000, a total of 320,000.

Source: USA Today
 

Drew

E.M.I.
This is becoming very disturbing to see and it is being seen more and more. The last thing economies need is more people out of work. I hope something changes SOON!!!!!
 

Rob Williams

Editor-in-Chief
Staff member
Moderator
I agree... I think half of the continent agrees. The strange situation the US economy is in isn't going over too well with most everyone, and though I don't even know what it would take to fix it, something does need to be done.
 
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