HP waves goodbye to 9,300 EMEA employees

European unions condemn 'job-shedding'

By Kelly Fiveash • Get more from this author

Posted in Financial News, 26th September 2008 15:48 GMT

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Hewlett-Packard will cut 9,300 jobs in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, following its $13.9bn takeover of EDS in August.

The firm confirmed last week that 24,600 jobs, or 7.5 per cent of its workforce, would be axed worldwide.

European trade union groups today lambasted the company’s decision to slash so many jobs in the EMEA region. The European Metalworkers’ Federation (EMF) and UNI-Europa condemned HP’s “job shedding”.

The unions, which met at HP and EDS works councils yesterday, claimed in a joint statement that HP was pursuing “merely a short sighted cost-cutting strategy which will deprive the company of its most valuable asset, a qualified workforce.”

HP announced the massive job cull early last week. The tech giant said workforce reduction would vary by country, based on local legal requirements and talks with works councils and employee representatives. Nearly half will occur in the US.

"The only business intention expressed so far is to offshore most of the jobs," said the EMF and UNI-Europa.

"From the trade unions' point of view this is not sufficient to ensure a long-term perspective for the company and its employees."

HP said last week that it expects the job cuts to result in annual savings for the company of about $1.8bn. It plans to reinvest the money in services sales coverage, delivery, and emerging markets. ®

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