Motorola reportedly cuts 1,000 jobs in China

Motorola reportedly has cut 1,000 jobs in China as it looks to trim costs amid weakening demand and poor performance by the company's mobile devices division. The layoffs are part of the company's previously announced plan to cut 4,000 jobs by the end of the first quarter. 

Chen Lei, the director of the public relations department at Motorola's Chinese business, said the department most affected by the cuts is the mobile devices sector, and the software platform development department in particular. Motorola has said it plans to focus intensely on Google's Android platform. 

Motorola announced in mid-January that it would be cutting 4,000 jobs, 3,000 of which would come from the mobile devices division. This follows the 3,000 job cuts that were announced last fall. The company said Tuesday that these cuts would save $1.5 billion in 2009, including $1.2 billion for the handset division.

Motorola's mobile devices division has continued to weaken, with sales of $2.35 billion in the fourth quarter, down 51 percent compared with the year-ago quarter. The company shipped 19.2 million handsets in the quarter, down 53 percent from the 40.9 million in the fourth quarter of 2007.

For more:
- see this article [1]
- see this People's Daily article [2]

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