HTC is to lay off around 1,500 employees, almost 25% of its workforce, as part of a major restructuring and bringing its work force down to just under 5,000. The process will be completed by the end of September. The company had around 19,000 staff five years ago, but many were recently transferred to Google. (HTC Finalises Smartphone Staff Transfer Deal with Google(
Analyst Comment
Taiwan has really had no luck with brands. One of its earlier successes was BenQ (which came out of Acer Peripherals) but that company nearly folded after the disastrous takeover of the Siemens mobile business in Germany. Acer has really struggled over recent years after seeming quite strong. Asus is probably the most successful of the IT brands. Giant bikes is a good global brand, but the other good Taiwanese brands are largely in the component space (Mediatek/MStar/TSMC etc) (BR)
