200 jobs go at Nortel's Monkstown plant

Nortel's Monkstown plant is to suffer 200 job cuts following the management's decision to swing the jobs axe across its entire business.

The County Antrim factory will see its 1,000-strong workforce slashed by a fifth as the global parent company attempts to reduce operating costs and achieve a return to profitability.

The headcount loss will be a huge loss to the plant which is the largest optical systems manufacturer in Europe. The decision was made in spite of the plant's record which includes winning last year's Northern Ireland Exporter of the Year Award.

Last year, Nortel announced that it would have to cut 44,000 jobs or half of its global workforce, and in May it revealed that 3,500 jobs in its optical components wing would be pared.

Nortel was one of Canada's corporate success stories of recent times and was the second largest telecoms manufacturer in North America. Two years ago the share price soared to over C$120, representing a third of the TSE300, however, yesterday the Nortel price stood at just C$2.66, having fallen 80% in the past 12 months. Many observers said investor confidence in the company was at an all-time low.

Established more than a century ago, Nortel Networks delivers networking and communications services and infrastructure for customers in more than 150 countries, including established carriers, new network operators, leading wireless service providers and enterprises.

Before the latest round of redundancies, the current staffing level in Monkstown stood at half of that two years ago before the group's financial worries surfaced.

(GMcG)