Nokia cutting 330 R&D jobs

Nokia said it would cut 330 research and development jobs at sites in Finland and Denmark. The company has been eliminating jobs across the board this year to rein in costs, but a company spokesman told Reuters that the handset maker also is moving toward launching fewer phone models in favor or more iconic phones.

The company said 230 positions will be eliminated at its Oulu site in Finland, and 100 will be cut at its site in Copenhagen. Nokia said it will try to find new jobs within the company for as many of the affected employees as possible. The company said the cuts affect 2 percent of its global R&D workforce, which numbers around 17,000 people.

So far this year, Nokia has announced 3,700 job cuts, including 1,300 voluntary separation packages. The handset maker instituted a cost-cutting program earlier this year to shave around $1 billion in expenses at its handset unit. Further, in October Nokia appointed its CFO as head of its low-end phones business one day after the company reported its worst quarterly results since it began quarterly reporting in 1996.

For more:
- see this AFP article [1]
- see this Reuters article [2]
- see this release [3]

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