Microsoft cutting more thousands more jobs from its smartphone branch
Microsoft is saying goodbye to Nokia and 1850 of its employees in a major move that will cost the Redmond company approximately $950 million USD in restructuring and severance compensations. 1350 of these cuts will hit Finland where Nokia is based and the move is expected to be finalized by July of next year. The recent development comes not one month after the announcement of a Nokia downsizing and adds fuel to earlier rumors that Microsoft may be axing its Windows Mobile platform entirely. The company even sold off its feature phone segment and 4500 of its employees to Foxconn last week for $350 million USD and to allow Finland-based company HMD to create new devices using the Nokia brand name.
Microsoft acquired the Nokia smartphone business back in April 2014 for 5.4 billion Euros. Nonetheless, under the new guidance of Satya Nadella, the business is no longer vital to the overall vision of Microsoft. The company announced back in July of 2015 a massive job cut of 7800 employees and a write-off of $7.6 billion USD all relating to its Nokia arm.
The latest and possibly final Lumia smartphones from Microsoft are the current 950 and 950 XL flagships and entry-level 550 and 650. It remains unlikely that any successors will launch this year since the company may be focusing on its more successful Surface tablets instead.
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