Chinese gear maker Huawei Technologies has cut its direct workforce by a third, in India, amid the ongoing merger consolidation in the telecom industry, especially after the Vodafone-Idea merger, and sector-wide financial stress.
“There has been a job cut since early this year with nearly 30% of the employees having now gone out of the company (Huawei),” a company source said, on the condition of anonymity, adding that some of them who were in the field teams have been rehired on a contractual basis.
The person said that the employees were asked to leave on the basis of performance, network shutdowns and declining telecom business.
According to Economic Times, Huawei India chief executive Jay Chen said in response to questions about job cuts “Huawei is a dynamic organisation and dynamism comes from our working policy. We put all resources to motivate our good performers, at the same time, never stop to manage the low and poor performers,”.
After cuts, the company has a workforce of more than 8,000 individuals spread across sales, supply chain, R&D and network engineering functions, and is among the main vendors for Vodafone and Idea to whom it offers managed services and network-related operations services.
The economic stress in the sector after the disruption caused by billionaire Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Jio’s entry, and the amalgamation between Idea and Vodafone has proved to be a double whammy for the network vendor’s workforce.
“Everything is uncertain for us. We are waiting for certainty and would need further clarity after the merger,” Chen said when asked about company’s operations in the wake of the merger between Idea and Vodafone.
