Huawei announces job cuts in India, reduces workforce by almost one-third

Chinese gear maker Huawei Technologies has cut its direct workforce by a third, in India, amid the ongoing merger consolidation in the telecom industry, especially after the Vodafone-Idea merger, and sector-wide financial stress.

“There has been a job cut since early this year with nearly 30% of the employees having now gone out of the company (Huawei),” a company source said, on the condition of anonymity, adding that some of them who were in the field teams have been rehired on a contractual basis.
The person said that the employees were asked to leave on the basis of performance, network shutdowns and declining telecom business.

“Huawei is a dynamic organisation and dynamism comes from our working policy. We put all resources to motivate our good performers, at the same time, never stop to manage the low and poor performers,” Huawei India chief executive Jay Chen told ET, in response to questions about job cuts.

After cuts, the company has a workforce of more than 8,000 individuals spread across sales, supply chain, R&D and network engineering functions, and is among the main vendors for Vodafone and Idea to whom it offers managed services and network-related operations services.

“It (job cuts) is a regular human resource (HR) practice, and the organisation is in constant churn that also depends upon the completion of various projects,” a Huawei executive told ET.
The economic stress in the sector after the disruption caused by billionaire Mukesh Ambani-owned Reliance Jio’s entry, and the amalgamation between Idea and Vodafone has proved to be a double whammy for the network vendor’s workforce.

“Everything is uncertain for us. We are waiting for certainty and would need further clarity after the merger,” Chen said when asked about company’s operations in the wake of the merger between Idea and Vodafone.

The Chinese firm, in 2015, had bagged multiple fourth-generation, or 4G, network rollout deals from Vodafone India and Idea Cellular for various circles. In March this year, the boards of Idea Cellular and Vodafone India have approved their business combination in a $23-billion deal.

Besides this M&A, Reliance Communications has shut its voice business and Aircel is shutting its services in six circles. Telenor India and the Tatas have sold their mobile phone business to market leader Bharti Airtel, leaving the Sunil Mittal-led telco, Vodafone-Idea merged company and Reliance Jio as the only major private players. Firms such as the TeamLease Services, Randstad India, Manpower Group Services, ABC Consultants and suggest that there would be nearly 25,000 more job cuts in the next one year.