Dell cuts 1,700 jobs as PC sales slow

LONDON (Brand Republic) - PC manufacturer Dell has axed 1,700 jobs, or 4% of its workforce, in response to a slowdown in the global PC market. This is the first time in the company’s 16-year history that it has made significant job cuts.

Most of the redundancies will be made at the company’s Texas headquarters and will affect the marketing, administrative and product-support departments. Some staff at its San Jose location will also lose their jobs, but its international branches will not be affected.

Dell, which employs 40,200 people worldwide, said that some of the cuts were a result of “lower expectations for industry and company growth”. Others were because of the recent reorganisation of a number of business units.

Profits for the fourth quarter were up by 16%. Net income was $508m (£349.6m), compared with $436m (£300.1m) a year earlier. Chief executive Michael Dell said he expected earnings for the current first quarter to be 17 cents a share, on sales of $8bn (£5.5bn) -- lower than analyst consensus estimates of 19 cents a share on sales of £8.5bn (£5.9bn).

The economic slowdown has hit many large technology companies. Yesterday, Cisco Systems said it was putting a hold on recruitment and telecoms equipment supplier Nortel Networks cut its revenue estimates for this year.

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This article was first published on brandrepublic.com