Marking the fourth major round of layoffs since 2002, Nortel CEO Mike Zafirovski said the company will cut 2,900 jobs and shift 1,000 positions to lower-cost locations in an attempt to generate savings of $400 million. The cuts reduce the Nortel workforce from a high of 95,000 in 2001 down to a mere 31,000. The job cutting and cost saving measures come at a time of fierce competition in the telephony space as rivals Alcatel-Lucent and the planned Nokia-Siemens JV are positioned as the heavyweights in the sector. Zafirovski promised more cost-cutting back in November.

For more on Nortel's additional jobs cuts:
- see this WSJ article [1] (sub. req.)