LeEco has no choice but to downsize its ambitious operations in ‘various geographies’, including India

Before judging Xiaomi too harshly for continuing to show hesitation regarding a proper US expansion, or Huawei for still struggling to gain traction in the uber-crowded and hyper-competitive smartphone market, consider LeEco for a second.

This Chinese tech and entertainment giant rushed its rise to global fame, spending way too much money too early on ramping up production, distribution and marketing efforts across “various geographies”, most notably stateside and in India.

Consequently, the company now faces big cash flow and stock trading problems, needing to lay off an unspecified number of employees around the world as part of a major business strategy revision. This comes at a time of “overall volatility and uncertainty forecast for the global economy”, with “business imperatives” entirely prompting certain “steps to ensure the sustainability and profitability” of LeEco’s operations.

In a nutshell, expenses have to be reduced ASAP for affordable, largely promising but far from flawless LeEco phones and TVs to stay with important American and Indian retailers, as well as continue selling through the OEM’s regional online LeMall branches.

In addition to honorable discharges of employees that will be offered outplacement services and severance packages, LeEco may also need to scale down device manufacturing and advertising. But fret not, as a “robust product pipeline” is still “in the offing.”

The post LeEco has no choice but to downsize its ambitious operations in ‘various geographies’, including India appeared first on Pocketnow.

Twitter shutting down Vine, lays off 300 employees

The home of the looping six-second video is about to be demolished. Twitter-owned social network Vine has announced that it will be shutting down its app sometime down the road, only giving us an indication of “months.”Users will be able to download their videos at some point and the website, with its existing content, will be kept alive for the time being. More details on the de-escalation process will be disclosed along the way.The

Continue reading »

The post Twitter shutting down Vine, lays off 300 employees appeared first on Pocketnow.

Lenovo lays off about 1,000, mostly in Motorola

Motorola is going through its fourth round of layoffs in five years under the reigns of Google and current owner Lenovo.The China-based technology manufacturer itself frames this as a less-than-2 percent cut of its global workforce, meaning that less than 1,100 jobs will be gone out of 55,000.“The majority of the positions are being eliminated are part of the ongoing strategic integration between Lenovo and its Motorola smartphone business,” Lenovo stated to Droid Life, “as the company further aligns its organization and streamlines its product portfolio to best compete ...

Continue reading »

The post Lenovo lays off about 1,000, mostly in Motorola appeared first on Pocketnow.

Microsoft staff cuts grow to 4,700 for the next year

In addition to the 1,850 jobs that are scheduled to be cut from Microsoft’s mobile unit, 2,850 positions will be cut over the course of fiscal year 2017.The move was revealed a week from its fourth quarter earnings announcement in the company’s Form 10-K filing to the Securities and Exchange Commission.We periodically evaluate how to best deploy the company’s resources. In ...

Continue reading »

The post Microsoft staff cuts grow to 4,700 for the next year appeared first on Pocketnow.

Cyanogen claims no “pivot” to apps, more information to follow

The CEO along with a co-founder of Cyanogen is responding to anonymously sourced reports that the company is turning away from its vision of an operating system based on Android in favor of apps. Both Android Police and Recode posted stories about the move.CEO Kirt McMaster tweeted out his response.Cyanogen NOT pivoting to apps. We are an OS company and our mission of creating an OPEN ANDROID stands. FALSE reporting was ...

Continue reading »

The post Cyanogen claims no “pivot” to apps, more information to follow appeared first on Pocketnow.

Cyanogen layoffs hit hard, a new charge on apps expected

Cyanogenmod is well and alive, but Cyanogen, the company, seems to be in a struggle.The company behind the more polished version of the Android ROM has laid off about 30 of its 136 employees, most of them working on quality assurance, systems and community support in the open source division. The smaller offices in Lisbon and India have been heavily reduced. Sources to Android Police say they aren’t ...

Continue reading »

The post Cyanogen layoffs hit hard, a new charge on apps expected appeared first on Pocketnow.

Microsoft announces yet another round of phone-related layoffs, $950 million restructuring charge

Things have gone from bad to worse to near-cataclysmic for Microsoft’s mobile phone-designing and manufacturing business of late, with the $7 billion acquisition of Nokia’s entire consumer hardware expertise back in 2014 yielding massive financial losses rather than the expected gains.Windows Mobile is a lost cause, although Redmond insists it hasn’t altogether given up on

Continue reading »

The post Microsoft announces yet another round of phone-related layoffs, $950 million restructuring charge appeared first on Pocketnow.

Microsoft Mobile Devices Sales rumored to disappear, Nokia feature phones license sold off

Cellphones have been difficult for Microsoft to not only get into, but to maintain its presence in. The acquisition and subsequent disposal of Nokia’s mobile hardware division was characterized as sad, mismanaged, misguided and inevitable, depending on who you talked to. Still, taking a $7.6 billion hit on the balance sheet and 7,800 cubicles had to be addressing a weakness somehow.It may prove to have been ...

Continue reading »

The post Microsoft Mobile Devices Sales rumored to disappear, Nokia feature phones license sold off appeared first on Pocketnow.

Microsoft to cut dozens more mobile positions in Finland

The wound grows deeper from the discharge of the Nokia acquisition.Microsoft, having recently revealed the mobile unit’s poor performance and forecast, has announced it would have to lay off “dozens” more jobs separate from the 2,300 eliminations the company took in Finland last year. That ...

Continue reading »

The post Microsoft to cut dozens more mobile positions in Finland appeared first on Pocketnow.

Lenovo, Motorola lay off hundreds after Q1 quagmire

East Asian OEM layoffs with global impacts bookend this Thursday. We had news this morning out of Taipei from HTC of a 15 percent cut in workforce, or roughly 2,400 positions. This evening’s news comes from Hong Kong and from Lenovo, where management has decided to eliminate just over 10 percent of its ranks of 60,000. Subsidiary company Motorola will end up taking a loss of 500 jobs, or a quarter of its current workforce.Lenovo specifically cited challenges facing Motorola in Latin American smartphone markets as well as ...

Continue reading »

The post Lenovo, Motorola lay off hundreds after Q1 quagmire appeared first on Pocketnow.

When HTC makes cuts out of necessity, we lose

HTC makes beautiful products. Historically, the company was selected by HP and Compaq (among others) to build the hardware that carried their corporate brands for years. Since then, HTC has tried to break into the market as its own brand – and has done remarkably well. When you think of smartphone brands, HTC ranks up near the top, alongside Apple, Samsung, and others. The financial side of the company, however, has been a bit more rocky. The solution? Following another difficult quarter with an operating loss of US$252 million, HTC makes cuts to try and restore profitability.Back ...

Continue reading »

The post When HTC makes cuts out of necessity, we lose appeared first on Pocketnow.