Sony To Fire 10,000 Workers In 2012

Sony is rumored to be preparing the dismissal of nearly 10,000 employees, an amount equal to almost 6 percent of the company’s global workforce.

According to a Nikkei report the jobs will happen mostly in Sony’s chemicals and small and midsize LCD operations. At this time it is still not clear as to whether Sony will choose to trim down its Japanese workforce or look to cut jobs from overseas operations.

News of the layoffs comes after an awful yearly forecast from the company and former executive deputy president Kazuo Hirai taking over the reigns from Howard Stringer. Sony’s annual loss is expected to reach $2.9 billion. Here’s the financial statement from Mashable.com for Sony’s Q3 earnings report:

“Third-quarter revenues also fell 17.4%. Almost all of Sony’s business units fared worse in the nine months ended Dec. 31, 2011 than in the comparable period in 2010. Among the poor performers: televisions (down 28.4% in sales), home audio and video (-14.8%) and digital imaging (-24.7%). Sales for PlayStation 3 also suffered after the company initiated a price cut last August from $300 to $250 for the entry-level 160 GB model.”

Sony shareholders and management are so angry over the company’s fall from grace that they may also request that up to seven executive directors return their yearly bonuses to the company as it continues to restructure and attempt to turn profitable.

Sony at this time has not confirmed or denied the report and more will likely be revealed on April 12 when Hirai unveils Sony’s official business plan.

The layoffs would cut the Sony workforce from 168,2000 to 158,000.