Hard drive maker Western Digital Corp. announced on Dec. 17 that it was cutting its workforce by 5%, or some 2,500 employees, because of weaker demand. "In the current macro economic climate, we expect demand weakness to last well into the middle of the 2009 calendar year," president and chief executive officer John Coyne said. "Consequently, we are taking additional steps to immediately reduce production capacity and operating expenses on a longer-term basis across our entire business."
Western Digital lowered its revenue outlook for the quarter ending on December 26 to $1.7 billion to $1.8 billion from the previous guidance of $2.025 billion to $2.150 billion issued in October.
The company is also reducing the compensation of the executive officers, board of directors and senior management of the company by an unspecified amount.
It said it was closing one of its three hard drive manufacturing facilities in Thailand and another manufacturing facility in Malaysia.
Western Digital said it expected the moves, to be completed by the end of March, to result in annual savings of $150 million.
Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2008
