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Fired: 7 Large Lay-Offs by Tech Companies

25.05.2012
Hewlett-Packard’s announcement that it would be in a massive restructuring plan, marks a new low for the beleaguered company that recently posted a significant 31 percent drop in profits. However, HP is not the first tech company (and perhaps won’t be the last either) that took a hack-and-slash approach to its workforce when facing economic uncertainty.

Here are seven major instances in the tech industry of employees facing the brunt for their employer’s misfortunes.

Yes, you read that right. In July 1993, IBM announced that it would , a number of jobs that most companies won’t be able to create in their entire lives. Out of that number, 35,000 were laid-off directly while 25,000 were offered early retirement, a move, the company claimed, cut annual costs by $4 billion.

The decision was made by Louis Gerstner, IBM’s then Chairman who had been brought in to revive the fortunes of the company that had just posted quarterly losses of $40 million ($64 million by today’s standards). To his credit, and is widely acknowledged to have saved IBM from failing as a company.