Some of the numbers are in on hotly rumored restructuring at Sony: 2,000 full-time positions will be cut and one of Sony's two flagship TV factories in Japan will be closed.
Sony CEO Howard Stringer is expected to announce as much at a news conference Thursday, according to Reuters, which on Wednesday afternoon cited reports, dated Thursday, from Japan's Nikkei financial daily. The restructuring plan comes along with what is reported to be the company's first annual loss in 14 years, details of which Stringer is expected to provide in the conference.
In December, Sony announced plans to curb investments, close as many as six plants and also eliminate 16,000 regular and contract jobs around over the world -- moves all aimed at saving $1.1 billion a year in operating and investment costs.
Earlier on Wednesday, however, the Financial Times reported that tensions were rising among Sony's top brass about which cuts were to be made and where. Stringer's plans to cut 16,000 overall "have met resistance from executives in [Sony's] manufacturing business," the Times reported, and "there is an acute sensitivity, too, about sacking Japanese staff, who believe that they have a 'job for life.'" The Financial Times also anonymously quoted a manager for Sony in the U.S. who alleged seeing "a lot of fat" in Sony's Japanese operations.
Speaking at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month, Stringer stressed the importance of building software into Sony's gadgets and making other improvements to keep up with evolving technology. He said, for example, that by 2011, Sony expects 90 percent of its products to be able to connect wirelessly to the Web.
