The new boss of flash manufacturer Spansion, John Kispert, has wielded the axe massively within three weeks of taking over as CEO. He is to cut a third of the workforce, representing some 3,000 people.
The move will cost Spansion $25m in charges, but will save $225m annually.
“The global recession is forcing us to make this very difficult decision in order to bring our costs in line with the current expectations for significantly reduced revenues,” said Kispert.
Kispert, formerly COO of KLA-Tencor, took over as CEO of Spansion earlier this month from Bertrand Cambou who had been CEO ever since Spansion was spun off from AMD and Fujitsu as a separate company. Fujitsu still owns 11.4 per cent of Spansion, and AMD still owns 8.7%.
In January, Spansion put itself up for sale or merger and hired Barclays Capital find a buyer. On Feb. 9 Spansion’s Japanese arm which operates a 300mm fab at Aizu, went into bankruptcy with debts of around $810m.
Yesterday, the Taiwanese assembly and test house, ChipMOS, said it had ended its contract with Spansion after Spansion had allegedly defaulted on $29m out of a $73m bill owed to ChipMOS.
Last year Spansion bought the Israeli flash IP company Saifun. Saifun CEO Boaz Eitan is currently president of Spansion.
This week the Spansion share price has sunk to five US cents.
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