HP To Shed A Further 5,000 Jobs

More details have emerged surrounding the fallout around the split in computer giant HP, with the company announcing it will be axing a further 5,000 workers as it looks to the future.

The company announced on Monday that it would be splitting its operations into two separate units, with the PC and printer business overseen by HP Inc and Hewlett-Packard Enterprise looking to focus on selling enterprise hardware and services.

CFO Cathie Lesjak said that during this planning phase HP had found new areas where it can cut costs, leading to the decision to cut another 5,000 workers as it looks to free up cash for research and development and sales investments.

Staying nimble

“While we had not planned to extend our programme beyond fiscal ’14 it has become clear that there are material incremental opportunities that enable savings and investments,” Lesjak explained on a call with financial analysts.

“But of course the marketplace never stands still and in our industry today more than ever, you have to compete harder and faster every single day, being nimble is the only path to winning,” she said, adding that the additional redundancies were not linked to the separation of the PC and printer division.

The news is the latest in a series of job cuts at HP stretching back to May 2012, when the company said it would axe 27,000 jobs as part of its “2012 Plan” to turnaround the business. Four months later, this was increased to 29,000 staff.

However as growth remained problematic, further job losses were needed, and in December 2012 HP said it would axe 34,000 jobs in total from its 250,000 global workforce.

The bloodbath was compounded further in May this year when HP said it could axe another 16,000 staff, with Lesjak confirming that 36,000 staff had been axed by the end of HP’s fiscal Q3 in August.

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