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EMC Corp. will lay off more than 1,300 workers—or about 7 percent of its global workforce—as it continues to struggle with the IT industry slump.
The Hopkinton, Mass., storage giant also announced on Thursday that it expects revenues for the third quarter, which ended Sept. 30, to come in at $1.25 billion, less than the $1.39 billion that the company generated in the second quarter.
Furthermore, EMCs Board of Directors plans to buy back 250 million shares, in addition to the 50 million it re-acquired in May, the company said in a statement in which it also said it will not meet its goal of returning to profitability in the second half of the 2002 fiscal year.
EMC is scheduled to report earnings Oct. 17.
The layoffs will leave EMC with 17,000 employees, officials said.
“The IT spending environment continues to be brutal,” President and CEO Joe Tucci said in a statement. “In fact, it got even worse at the very end of the quarter. Our third quarter was on track until late September. [However,] we saw no significant change in the competitive environment during the quarter.”
“We believe that EMC is taking steps in the right direction by reducing its fixed-cost structure and increasing its share buyback program,” analyst Harry Blount said in a report issued Friday by Lehman Brothers Inc., in New York City.
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