Revenue Drop, Dismal Outlook Lead To Layoffs At GE Access

GE Access

The Boulder-based distributor blamed the moves on a sudden drop in revenue in September and a dismal outlook for the near future.

"We have a responsibility to make sure we remain strong, viable and operating in a profitable manner," said GE Access CEO John Paget said. "We didn't want to wait and see if in fact this would carry itself out over the next 18 to 24 months. CIOs continue to put off [spending on IT projects."

Among those let go were five executives, including Michael Minard, executive vice president and the No. 2 man behind Paget.

Other executives let go were CIO Randy Grissom; Rick Winston, general counsel; John Dardick, vice president of operations; and Ross Churchill, who headed up enterprise business services, according to Paget.

Other employees will take on additional roles going forward, Paget said.

Solution providers should not see a decrease in support from GE Access, he said.

"Our customers are telling us what is really critical to them are our financial services offerings, our business-building services and good product availability. We will continue to make sure to remain focused for our customers as they work through this decrease in their business too," he said.

After the cuts, GE Access will have about 630 employees, down from a high of 1,100 about two years ago when the IT industry was riding high.

"It's been a long two years. It was two years ago November when the IT industry seemed to fall off quickly. We didn't react quickly as we should have. All companies are reacting more quickly now," Paget said.

He said: "It's worse than the seasonal models we've seen at in the past. We anticipated a much stronger quarter. My biggest concern is not a specific quarter; these [layoffs were not based on the quarter, but forward looking for the whole IT industry. We sincerely hope we're wrong."