• London-based advertising company WPP Group Plc will cut a total of 7200 jobs this year, hurt by cuts in client companies’ advertising spending amid the recession. Of the total planned job reductions, about half has already been lost, with the rest expected to go by the end of 2009.
• Software group Sage will announce 1000 job cuts.
• Plumbing giant Wolseley is axing more than 250 jobs at two sites in Lancashire and Oxfordshire. The bulk of the losses will be made at its distribution centre in Chorley with 133 jobs going when the lease on the building expires this August and it is also closing a distribution centre in Didcot with the loss of 76 jobs.
• XFM and Gold radio stations will be losing at least 20 jobs. Redundancies are expected online, in marketing and design departments too.
• Global defence giant BAE Systems announced the loss of 500 jobs and the closure of three sites, partly because of the withdrawal of British troops from Iraq. 50 jobs will go at its Newcastle plant on Scotswood Road, while sites at Telford in Shropshire, Leeds and Guildford in Surrey will close by June next year, with some compulsory redundancies expected.
• Five Pizza Hut restaurants are to close with the loss of around 130 jobs after the company which holds the Northern Ireland franchise went into administration.
• Vestas Wind Systems will slash it’s workforce by 1900. The company that makes wind turbines will make the redundancies mostly in Denmark and the UK, include 450 at it’s factory on the Isle Of Wight.

Quoted from Nashville Business Journal

Clear Channel Communications will cut about 1500 jobs, or 7 percent of its work force, in a move to save $400 million.
The job cuts would mostly affect the radio station chain’s advertising salespeople, according to the story, which cited unnamed sources. The company employs about 20,000 in total.

Job losses: 1500

Quoted from Bloomberg

Not a great Friday after news  that roughly 21000 jobs would be lost for at least 20 companies.

• Hertz, the second-largest U.S. rental-car company, said it will cut more than 4000 jobs.
• WellPoint, the second-largest U.S. health insurer, will end 1500 jobs, which include 600 workers and 900 open positions.
• Clear Channel Communications Inc. will lay off 1500 employees on Jan. 20, mostly in ad sales.
• ConocoPhillips, the second-largest U.S. refiner, announced after the markets closed that it plans to cut 4 percent of its workforce, or about 1350 jobs.
• Advanced Micro, the second-largest producer of personal- computer processors, said it will eliminate 1100 jobs by the end of the first quarter.
• Amonil said it will cut 45 percent of its staff, or 389 jobs, this year.
• Magneti Marelli will eliminate 800 jobs in Brazil, or 10 percent of its workforce there.
• General Electric Co.‘s finance arm may cut 7500 to 11000 jobs, or at least 10 percent of its workforce.
• De Beers, the world’s biggest diamond company, said it will cut jobs at its six mines in South Africa, totaling “less than” 1000 people.
• Interwoven Inc., the provider of data-management software, announced after trading hours that it would cut 70 jobs.
• Blue Cross Blue Shield of Michigan will cut up to 1000 jobs in 2009.
• Renold Plc, the maker of the chains that drive the clock in London’s Big Ben, announced 350 job reductions.
• WS Atkins Plc, the U.K.’s biggest engineering-design company, plans to eliminate 210 jobs at its Middle East operations.
• Scania AB, Sweden’s second-largest maker of heavy trucks, said it won’t renew contracts for 2000 temporary employees to adjust production because of weaker demand.
• Haynes International Inc., the manufacturer of alloys for use in aerospace and chemical processing, said it will eliminate 12 percent of its global workforce.
• Varian Inc., manufacturer of scientific instruments and vacuum technologies, will shed 240 jobs.
• Banco Santander SA, Spain’s biggest bank, eliminated 400 jobs in Brazil after buying ABN Amro Holding NV’s Banco Real unit in the country.
• Harry & David Holdings, a fruit and food retailer, said it would cut more than 100 positions.

Job losses: +-21000

Original article By Oshrat Carmiel, ocarmiel1@bloomberg.net