No plans to cut jobs in India: Sony

Japanese electronics major Sony, which has announced a massive layoff of 16,000 employees across the world has said that it has no plans to cut jobs in India given the strong business growth in the country.
“The Tokyo-headquartered firm is reviewing its business in each country for the announced cost-cutting programme, but the Indian business is unlikely to see any job cuts given a ‘healthy business growth’,” Sony India Managing Director Masaru Tamagawa said in an email statement.
Tamagawa was responding to a query on whether India would be impacted from Sony’s planned cost-cutting measure to eliminate 8,000 full-time staff and another 8,000 temporary employees from its global workforce.
“Based on expectations of the future economic environment and the electronics business, Sony Corporation is enacting various measures, such as lowering fixed costs and reducing headcount at a macro level,” he said.
“Our Headquarters is now starting to review each country’s, business, and sales operation. However in India given our healthy business growth, we do not foresee any manpower reduction,” he added.
Yesterday, the Japanese firm announced the job cuts as part of a billion-dollar cost saving exercise in a bid to improve profitability and enhance operational efficiency in its electronics businesses.
Besides, under the corporate restructuring measures, Sony is planning to reduce investment in the electronics business by about 30% by fiscal 2010, compared to its mid-term plan.
The electronics giant also plans to reduce the total number of manufacturing sites by 10% from the current total of 57 by 31 March, 2010.