本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛FRANKFURT, July 4 (Reuters) - German electronics and engineering group
Siemens AG (FIE) said on Wednesday it planned to cut 2,000 jobs worldwide
from its Siemens Business Services unit in response to slowing demand for IT
services.

In a letter to staff, Siemens management said it would cut 1,600 jobs from SBS
operations in Germany, or more than 10 percent of the unit's 15,000-strong
workforce, and did not rule out compulsory redundancies.

The planned cuts bring total job losses at Siemens to about 10,000 so far this
year after 8,100 jobs were cut from the group's telecoms equipment businesses
earlier in the year.

A spokesman said the group had not yet determined the timescale of the cuts.

"This discussion will take some time," he said.

The move follows the merger last year of Siemens Business Services with the
former Information Technology services unit.

Siemens Business Services, which last year generated sales of 5.8 billion euros
($4.90 billion), provides information technology and electronic business
consulting services.更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net

本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛NEW YORK (Reuters) - Business-to-business software company i2
Technologies Inc. warned on Tuesday that its second-quarter results will be
lower than expected because of "difficult" market conditions.

For the second quarter, Dallas-based i2 anticipates reporting a loss of about
12 cents a share, excluding a $25 million-to-$27 million, or 4-cent-a-share,
bad debt charge. The company took the charge primarily because of
conditions "surrounding dot.com and public marketplace customers," i2 said
in a statement.

Analysts on average were expecting i2 (ITWO: Research, Estimates) to post
a loss of 6 cents a share, according to Thomson Financial/First Call.

"Obviously, we're really disappointed in the numbers," Greg Brady, i2's chief
executive, said on a conference call with analysts on Tuesday morning. "I2
doesn't understand how to miss a number."

The net loss excludes a restructuring
charge of $33 million-to-$35 million,
or 5 cents a share, as well as other
adjustments. Without the additional
charge and various other
adjustments, i2 expects to report a
net loss per share for the second
quarter of about $2.10 to $2.12 a
share.

In addition, i2 said it expected revenue in the range of $235 million-to-$240
million, down from previously lowered expectations of between $275 million
and $300 million. Analysts on average had predicted i2 would generate $282
million for the second quarter, according to First Call.

"It's a huge miss," Brendan Barnicle, an analyst with Pacific Crest
Securities, said. "To miss two quarters in a row after you'd already lowered
the bar that low is very, very disappointing."

Shares of i2, which makes software that lets companies share their inventory
and planning data with suppliers over the Web, were down 1.59 percent, or
35 cents, at $17.87 on heavy morning trade on the Nasdaq. The stock was
among the most actively traded issues. The U.S. markets closed at 1:00
p.m. ET Tuesday and are closed for July 4.

The news prompted brokerage firm Merrill Lynch to cut its mid-term stock
rating on the software firm to neutral from accumulate.

Dependency on big deals

i2's big shortfall is a clear demonstration of the effects of the company's
dependency on large deals, said Steve Bowen, an analyst with First
Analysis.

Although the average price of i2's customer deals has fallen to $1 million in
the second quarter compared with $1.8 million in the first quarter, Bowen said
i2 was clearly finding the transition hard to make.

"Clearly the difficulties of transitioning from selling large, multimillion deals to
smaller deals is taking some time," Bowen said. "Even though they're
making some headway, it requires more sales activity to hit the larger
numbers we're accustomed to."

The news comes as even more of a surprise given comments from i2
executives during the second quarter. In May, at i2's eDay analyst
conference in New York, Brady said the estimates issued by the company
for its second quarter were "conservative." And since then, analysts have
widely expected the company to meet or beat their lowered estimates.

"I think the thing that's most disappointing is that it clearly caught
management by surprise," Pacific Crest's Barnicle said. "They've been trying
to get things back in line throughout the last 90 days, but apparently they
weren't able to do enough of this fast enough."更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net

本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛PALO ALTO, Calif. (AP) - Computer and printer maker Hewlett-Packard Co.
has asked 14,000 of its workers in Asia to take pay cuts or use additional
vacation days in an effort to trim costs.

Similar to terms announced for U.S.
workers last week, company
employees have three choices: take
a 10 percent pay cut, use up eight
paid vacation days, or take a 5
percent cut and four vacation days.
The program is voluntary and about
23,000 workers worldwide have
signed up so far, according to a Hewlett-Packard spokeswoman.

The company said the voluntary vacations and pay cuts would save money,
but would not disclose further details.

The pay cuts for both Asian and American workers will be implemented for
four months. Employees have until July 6 to decide if they want to take part.

Hewlett-Packard announced in January it was cutting 1,700 marketing
positions. Four months later, HP said it was trimming 3,000 management
jobs. The company currently employs about 90,000 people worldwide.更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net

本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛Silicon Valley faces slowest week in slow economy

Reuters News Agency

San Francisco 更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net

本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛NEW YORK (CP) - Moody's Investors Service lowered its rating on Nortel Networks debt and preferred shares Tuesday, saying it will also review Nortel's ability to cope with a severe downturn affecting the telecom industry.
The Wall Street bond rating agency said Tuesday it had lowered its rating on Nortel's long-term unsecured debt to A3 from A2.
That's still considered investment quality, according to the Moody's rating system, which assigns B ratings to medium-quality debt and C ratings to poor-quality debt.
It also reduced its rating on Nortel preferred stock to the medium-grade baa1, down from a3.
''The continuing review will focus on the ability of Nortel to address end markets that will be experiencing a more severe and protracted period of industry adjustment than had been recently envisioned,'' Moody's stated.
Nortel announced last month that it expects to report a net loss of $19.2 billion (U.S.) for the quarter ended June 30, which would be the biggest quarterly loss ever by a Canadian company.
The company also said June 15 that it would cut 10,000 additional jobs by the end of September, bringing the total this year to 30,000.
Nortel also said at the time it had arranged to borrow $2 billion from U.S. investment banks and would suspend dividend payments on its common shares to conserve cash.
Nortel spokesperson Tina Warren said the downgrade ''was not unexpected,'' adding that ''this action will not have a significant impact on our business.
''We are making continuing progress with our alignment plan,'' Warren said. ''And we are confident our ratings will remain solidly within investment grade.''更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net

Wednesday, July 4, 2001

Delano Technology Corp. is cutting 180 jobs, or 60 per cent of its work
force, to rein in costs as its revenue falls and losses mount, the company
said yesterday. The Markham, Ont.-based software company said it will
have a loss of between 30 and 35 cents a share, but had $20-million in cash
as of June 30. Delano also announced the resignation of chief executive
officer John Foresi, president David Frankland and vice-president of
marketing Ellen Olson.

本文发表在 rolia.net 枫下论坛Wednesday, July 4, 2001

VANCOUVER -- News that Pivotal Corp. will post a loss in its fourth
quarter sent the stock tumbling on Canadian and U.S. markets yesterday.

Pivotal shares slid almost 14 per cent to close at $22.40 on the Toronto
Stock Exchange, down from a close of $29 on June 29.

Pivotal shares also slumped on the Nasdaq Stock Market, where the stock
closed at $13.99 (U.S.), down $4.21 from July 2.

Vancouver-based Pivotal, which makes customer relationship management
(CRM) software, announced Monday that it expects a fourth-quarter loss of
between 28 and 32 cents a share.

Analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial/First Call had been expecting a
profit of 4 cents a share for the quarter.

Pivotal president and chief executive officer Norm Francis said customers
are still buying CRM products but are often postponing purchases or
implementing new technology in small, incremental stages.

Pivotal's software helps companies collect information about customers and
use that information to tailor offerings to individual customers.

Pivotal gets over half of its revenue from software licences -- the remainder
comes from service and maintenance contracts -- so any slowdown in
software sales has a quick impact on its bottom line.

"Our business model means that any move in licence revenue has a
dramatic impact [on profits]," Mr. Francis said, adding that Pivotal's deals
got smaller as the quarter wound down. "Customers in every industry are
worried about their own businesses."

Analysts said Pivotal is also feeling the pinch of increased competition and
discounting in the CRM market.

In a report yesterday, Merrill Lynch & Co. analyst Christopher Shilakes said
Pivotal remains one of the leading players in the clutch of companies
pitching CRM systems to mid-sized companies.

But "we are concerned about the pressures from the current economic
environment and a more focused set of competitors, especially Siebel
[Systems Inc.], leading to increasing discounting and reduced deal sizes
that has even reached Pivotal's mid-market stronghold," Mr. Shilakes said.

In his report, Mr. Shilakes, who is based in San Francisco, cut his
recommendation on Pivotal from "long-term accumulate" to "neutral."

Mr. Francis said yesterday that Pivotal has not been discounting its
products, but that price cuts made by some of its competitors affected
results in the most recent quarter.

"In a few situations, we did see some 11th-hour discounting and that did
cause customers to pause and take longer with their decisions."

Mr. Francis said Pivotal has not been losing ground to competitors such as
San Mateo, Calif.-based Siebel Systems, which counts many large
multinationals among its customers.

Pivotal plans to announce its fourth-quarter results on July 26.更多精彩文章及讨论，请光临枫下论坛 rolia.net