Cisco will remove 5,500 jobs worldwide – Le Figaro

The US group, which employs more than 72,000 people worldwide, will separate 7% of its workforce. In a period of transition, the company suffered the brunt of competition from cloud services.

The time is not at the party for Cisco Systems. The American group took advantage of the publication of its annual results to announce a restructuring plan. More than 5,500 jobs will be deleted from the first quarter of 2017. This represents about 7% of the total workforce of the group, which employs over 72,000 people worldwide, including 1,200 in France. The plan had already been rumored by several US media, the specialized site CRN. “Cisco needs new talent to ensure its future around the software,” explained an anonymous source cited by CRN to justify these cuts.

Cisco specializes in telecoms networks and servers it sells to entreprisesElle claims in 2016 annual sales of $ 49.2 billion. Like other computer giants, Cisco is now in a transition period. The company suffered the brunt of competition from cloud services: Amazon, Google and others offer companies to host their data, rather than equip complex and expensive servers to maintain. The telecoms business is also impacted by lower order operators and the trend toward virtualization of networks. Cisco must necessarily change.

The transition was first made at the direction of the company: John Chambers, former emblematic boss of the company, has given way to a new CEO in July 2015, Chuck Robbins. It now has the difficult task of diversifying the activities of this behemoth of computing. The group had already cut more than 6,000 jobs in the summer of 2014. “We want to reinvest any savings in our new business and continue to invest in growth areas,” promised the company in a statement.

Cisco tightens its belt, but also opens his wallet to accelerate its transition. The US company has over $ 63 billion in cash. She leads an ambitious takeovers specialized startups in cybersecurity, Internet objects or data analysis. The group has acquired six companies a year and a half, including Jasper Technologies, for which Cisco has spent over $ 1.4 billion. End 2015, John Chambers announced plans to invest more than $ 200 million in the French start-up.

The challenges faced by Cisco are also those of other IT legends, also face a perilous transition facing the transformation of their industry. In 2014, Microsoft has removed more than 18,000 jobs, the largest in its history restructuring plan and 7800 other jobs the following year. HP today separated into two entities, announced last year it would cut 33,300 jobs by 2018. Intel is also expected to part with 12,000 employees worldwide, representing 11% of its total workforce. Dell has already removed him more than 10,000 positions last year.