Vodafone Group PLC’s new chief executive officer, Margherita Della Valle, yesterday unveiled a plan to revive growth at the telecom giant, pledging to slash jobs and simplify the company’s corporate structure.
Vodafone is to cut about 11,000 roles across the about 104,000 people it employs over the next three years, work to turn around its German business and start a “strategic review” of its Spanish unit, the Newbury, England-based company said in a statement.
Della Valle, a 29-year Vodafone veteran who was previously chief financial officer and interim CEO before she was made permanent in the top role last month, said in the statement that she would reallocate resources to focus on the “quality service our customers expect” and grow the Vodafone Business unit.
Photo: Reuters
“Our performance has not been good enough. To consistently deliver, Vodafone must change,” she said in the statement. “My priorities are customers, simplicity and growth. We will simplify our organization, cutting out complexity to regain our competitiveness.”
The company’s adjusted free cash flow, a closely watched metric, would drop by about 31 percent to 3.3 billion euros (US$3.65 billion) in the fiscal year ending in March, following divestments, but also taking a hit due to “expected working capital movements,” the company said.
Much of the decline is due to a change in German law which affects how Vodafone is able to collect money from customers, a spokesman said.
A company-compiled consensus of analyst estimates had put the figure at 3.6 billion euros.
Earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization after leases are expected to be 13.3 billion euros in the year ending in March, which Vodafone described as “broadly flat” once factoring in the partial sale of mobile mast unit Vantage Towers AG and divestment of its business in Hungary.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US. Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it. TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer
PROTECTION: The investigation, which takes aim at exporters such as Canada, Germany and Brazil, came days after Trump unveiled tariff hikes on steel and aluminum products US President Donald Trump on Saturday ordered a probe into potential tariffs on lumber imports — a move threatening to stoke trade tensions — while also pushing for a domestic supply boost. Trump signed an executive order instructing US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to begin an investigation “to determine the effects on the national security of imports of timber, lumber and their derivative products.” The study might result in new tariffs being imposed, which would pile on top of existing levies. The investigation takes aim at exporters like Canada, Germany and Brazil, with White House officials earlier accusing these economies of
GREAT SUCCESS: Republican Senator Todd Young expressed surprise at Trump’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running US lawmakers who helped secure billions of dollars in subsidies for domestic semiconductor manufacturing rejected US President Donald Trump’s call to revoke the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, signaling that any repeal effort in the US Congress would fall short. US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who negotiated the law, on Wednesday said that Trump’s demand would fail, while a top Republican proponent, US Senator Todd Young, expressed surprise at the president’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running. The CHIPS Act is “essential for America leading the world in tech, leading the world in AI [artificial
REACTIONS: While most analysts were positive about TSMC’s investment, one said the US expansion could disrupt the company’s supply-demand balance Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) new US$100 billion investment in the US would exert a positive effect on the chipmaker’s revenue in the medium term on the back of booming artificial intelligence (AI) chip demand from US chip designers, an International Data Corp (IDC) analyst said yesterday. “This is good for TSMC in terms of business expansion, as its major clients for advanced chips are US chip designers,” IDC senior semiconductor research manager Galen Zeng (曾冠瑋) said by telephone yesterday. “Besides, those US companies all consider supply chain resilience a business imperative,” Zeng said. That meant local supply would
RSS