Cisco Systems announced a major reorganization of its operations Thursday and reaffirmed that its business is showing signs of steadying in the first weeks of the current quarter.
The changes will align Cisco's (CSCO) focus around customers' requirements as the networking and communications markets consolidate, said John Chambers, the company's chief executive.
Under the new plan, Cisco's engineering organization will focus on 11 technology groups.
We are making these changes at a time when we are beginning to see signs that our business is stabilizing," Chambers said, adding orders for the first few weeks of the quarter that started July 29 are in line with expectations.
---
Lucent predicts profitability: Lucent Technologies says it has more than enough cash on hand to weather the downturn in the telecommunications industry and expects its operations to become profitable by next year.
Executives of the company said that new financing and deep job cuts had given them the financial flexibility to focus their business on their top 30 customers, which represent 75 percent of their sales.
After posting a hefty $3.25 billion third-quarter loss last month, Lucent (LU) announced more cost cutting, including the reduction of another 15,000 to 20,000 jobs and the elimination of its 2 cent quarterly dividend.
Moving to end some of the uncertainty among its staff, Lucent told 2,200 U.S. employees that their positions would be eliminated and will start notifying an additional 2,500 outside the United States. It plans to lay off another 1,000 U.S. workers by September and 4,000 mostly foreign workers between October and March.
---
J-Phone mergers: Japan Telecom, Japan's third-largest telecom firm, said it would merge its J-Phone group wireless units on Nov. 1, a streamlining move sought by its largest shareholder, Vodafone.
"We decided on this merger to make a major leap forward, with the aim of quickly rising to number two in the industry and taking on NTT DoCoMo," Japan Telecom said in a statement.
Under the deal, J-Phone East, J-Phone West and J-Phone Tokai Co. Ltd. will become part of holding company J-Phone Communications. Japan Telecom will hold a 45.05 percent share of the merged entity, and Vodafone (VOD) will hold 39.67 percent.
**
AP and Reuters contributed to this report.
