We have some bad news for Nokia Fans worldwide. Nokia will need to save more then $1 billion in 2016 and to reach this goal Nokia will cut massively into their worldwide workforce…

Recently Nokia finalized their Merger with Alcatel-Lucent SA. Following the Nokia 2016 Merger, Nokia CEO Rajeev Suri announced end of last year the need to reduce Nokia’s yearly cost by 900 Million Euro, or 1 Billion USD per year. Mostly Nokia will reduce overlapping products, services and sales positions after paying $18 Billion for Alcatel. According to people familiar with the plan Nokia plans to let go off 10-15000 people, out of 104.000. That is a very significant staff reduction of nearly 15%.

Most of the Jobs will be cut in Europe, with Nokia Finland and Nokia Germany taking the major cuts. France will keep most of their jobs, due to prior Nokia promises. “This was a match between France and Finland,” said Pertti Porokari, head of the Union of Professional Engineers in Finland and “Finland lost.”
Back in 2000 Nokia Finland had 24000 people when they were dominating the Global Smartphone Market. This number has dropped to 7000 after the Microsoft deal and will drop further now.

The reductions are aimed at helping Nokia 2016 to cope with a challenging business environment in 2016 and intense competition from China’s Huawei Technologies Co. Wireless Carriers worldwide are decreasing spend in 4G Technology, the main business of Nokia-Alcatel. Most of the Jobs will be cut in Europe, with Finland, Germany and France taking the major hit.

Nokia Comeback to Gadgets in 2016?

The only bright light in this situation if there can be any, is that Nokia might be looking to further grow in other areas out side network technology. Nokia recently bought healthcare manufacturer Withings and might even make a comback to Nokia Phones in 2016 to cash in on their brand value. Source Bloomberg