THOMSON Reuters Corp, formed by Thomson Corp's US$15.9 billion purchase of Reuters Group Plc, plans to eliminate about 835 jobs to help make the cost savings promised by executives.
The reductions include 140 news positions, as many as 650 jobs in content, technology and operations, and 45 posts in sales and service, according to e-mails sent by Thomson Reuters managers to staff and obtained by Bloomberg News.
More than half the news jobs to be cut are in Europe, the New York-based company told its journalists yesterday.
Chief Executive Officer Thomas Glocer, 48, is integrating legal databases, bond-trading networks, news, and advisory services. The company, which has about 50,000 employees, said May 1 annualized savings will total US$1 billion by the end of 2010 and US$1.2 billion a year later.
"There are obvious areas such as databases and news where job cuts are unavoidable and necessary because of overlaps," said Gareth Thomas, an analyst at Collins Stewart Plc in London who recommends selling Thomson Reuters shares. "But investors also want to know what the impact on profitability will be, or how much of the savings will go through to the bottom line and how much will be reinvested."
Thomson Reuters spokeswoman Victoria Brough declined to comment on individual departments' job-cutting plans. UK newspaper The Guardian reported the content, technology and operations job cuts on Friday.
Bloomberg LP, the parent of Bloomberg News, competes with Thomson Reuters in selling financial and legal information and trading systems.
Thomson Reuters will have 2,500 news employees by the end of the year, compared with more than 2,380 at Reuters at the end of 2007, editor-in-chief David Schlesinger wrote in an e-mail.
"Unfortunately, the overlap we've found and our need to run the operation efficiently means that we will have to eliminate around 140 jobs worldwide by the end of the year," Schlesinger wrote.
In a May 16 e-mail, Peter Moss, the global head of content, technology and operations, said his unit will cut 600 to 650 jobs this year. Loris Barisa, the managing director for Continental Europe, the Middle East and Africa, said 45 of the 1,305 sales and service jobs in the region will be eliminated.