Lenovo Cuts Hundreds of Workers

Lenovo on Wednesday confirmed it has cut hundreds of employees in its global workforce as part of its ongoing strategy amid rising revenue.

Kristy Fair, Lenovo’s director of global communications, said about 500 positions are impacted by the layoffs. The computer maker now has about 5,000 workers in the United States and 57,000 workers globally.

She wouldn’t specify what types of positions are being eliminated or where they are located.

Lenovo’s Kristy Fair

“While these actions aren’t easy, they are necessary as we continue to execute our strategy for intelligent transformation while achieving sustainable, profitable growth,” Fair said.

Lenovo’s latest quarterly earnings topped analysts’ estimates. Profit during its fourth quarter increased nearly threefold to $118 million, compared to analysts’ average estimate of $106 million. Revenue of $11.7 billion also surpassed projections.

For fiscal year 2018-19, Lenovo’s revenue exceeded $50 billion for the first time, up 12.5%, to a record-breaking $51 billion.

Earlier this month at its Lenovo Accelerate conference, the company admitted losing its way with the channel and said it’s determined to turn that around by making a channel-first commitment.

Globally, about 80-85% of Lenovo business goes through partners. In the U.S., that figure is closer to 50%, largely because the U.S. organization was on a path, over the last couple of years, to build more of a direct organization. That has changed as Lenovo is reorienting its business around the channel.

Also this week, the Silicon Valley Business Journal is reporting that Oracle has spent months quietly cutting jobs across the United States, with some employees worrying that as much as 10 percent of the company’s 138,000 employees could be out of a job by the time the cuts are complete.

Oracle wouldn’t comment on the layoffs.