A number of IBMers are trying on the new identity of “ex-IBMers” today as the company’s 2014 downsizing has come to pass. IBM won’t say how many people. And you can’t count it up because the company has, for the first time in years, eliminated a document that was part of packages given to terminated employees, claiming “privacy,” which a workers’ group leader called “absurd.” The cuts hit Dutchess County and sites across the United States, say people who spoke with the Poughkeepsie Journal or with the workers’ group, Alliance@IBM.
It looks like the IBM layoffs that started in India and Europe earlier this month have arrived stateside. CNET, citing an unnamed source, reported that IBM is laying off up to 25 percent of its hardware unit employees. And reports in the Burlington Free Press confirmed cuts in IBM’s Essex Junction facility. Other outlets reported cuts in in Poughkeepsie and Endicott, N.Y. The IT giant telegraphed cuts to come on its last earnings call in January when it reserved $1 billion to cover workforce reductions in the coming year. At that time analysts estimated that would mean cuts of 10,000 to 15,000 jobs out of IBM’s total 400,000 workforce. Since then, IBM sold its its X86 server unit to Lenovo so there were bound to be reductions in hardware personnel. IBM said 7,500 of those Technology & Systems group employees would be offered jobs at Lenovo.