HP to Cut 24,600 Jobs, 8% of Total Workforce

Times are not good in the financial world, with large investment firms closing shop and even one of the world’s largest insurers also scrambling to come up with some $75 billion just to stay afloat. Hewlett-Packard might be feeling the effects of the economy too, but they claim upcoming job cuts are to streamline business and doesn’t seem to be the result of the current state of things.

HP recently acquired Electronic Data Systems, which is where most of the job cuts will be. Almost half of the 24,600 will be workers inside the US. The company also adds that half of the positions will be refilled in the future as different jobs within the company, but that won’t be quick enough for the folks laid-off.

The biggest areas where the hit will be noticeable is with their finance, human resources and legal departments, where USA Today claims a lot of overlap can occur. But 24,600? Sure doesn’t sound like a healthy culling, to say the least.

Djurdjevic said EDS had been cutting jobs before it was acquired by HP, and that some investors were concerned the cutbacks did not address a key problem for EDS in the need to ink more profitable deals, a challenge that now falls to HP. HP had not previously detailed how many employees of the combined company would lose their jobs. Before the acquisition, HP had 178,000 people and EDS had 142,000, a total of 320,000.