HP to close its Rüsselsheim, Germany site by the end of October, cutting 850 jobs in the process

Hewlett-Packard (HP) has announced today that it will be closing a site in Russelsheim, located south-west of Frankfurt, before the end of October, laying off 850 employees in the process.

The staff cuts represent 8.5 percent of HP’s workforce in Germany, and is part of a broader “restructuring effort” announced previously. According to reports by Reuters, the remaining 250 employees at the site may be able to transfer to other HP locations or one of the company’s clients. It means the technology firm will continue to employ roughly 10,000 people across the country.

A report by Nasdaq cites Mike Nefkens, executive vice president of HP Enterprise Services, who said: “The changes we are announcing in Germany today are a necessary part of our commitment to deliver our long-term operating model.”

HP announced in May last year that they would be cutting at least 27,000 jobs – or eight percent of its workforce at the time – by the end of the 2014 fiscal year. That figure rose steadily to 29,000 in a regulatory filing submitted in September, however.

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At the time HP’s president and CEO, Meg Whitman, said that the cuts, along with other changes, would help “streamline” the company in the future. “While some of these actions are difficult because they involve the loss of jobs, they are necessary to improve execution and to fund the long-term health of the company,” she said.

Since then though, the company’s affairs haven’t improved. Its fourth-quarter financial figures last year showed that Personal Systems revenue was down by 14 percent year over year, with a 3.5 percent operating margin.

Commercial revenue, meanwhile, decreased by 13 percent, and consumer revenue declined 16 percent. Part of that at least was because total hardware was down 12 percent, with both desktop PCs and laptops down by 12 percent also.

That performance has been further beleaguered by the company’s relationship with British software company Autonomy, which it took an $8.8 billion writedown on following its original $11.7 billion deal last summer. The reasons behind the writedown  are still being investigated – last month it was revealed that the Department of Justice (DOJ) was involved.

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