Milano – The latest tech giant to participate in the dances, announcing a global staff cut planis the manufacturer of computers and printers Hewlett Packard (HP)with a rumored reduction of around 10% of its workforce worldwide to focus on artificial intelligence and “increase efficiency”. Colossus which, among other things, has just inaugurated the new one Experience Center in Cernusco sul Naviglioa space “where HP shows its idea of the future of work” through “an ecosystem where artificial intelligence it makes daily experiences fluid.”
The other giants
Amazonwho yesterday met the CGIL, CISL and UIL unions at the Assolombarda headquarters, in Italy will manage the global cuts plan launched in the USA through voluntary and incentivized exits, excluding at the moment the possibility of collective dismissals. Layoffs put on the table in Milan by other multinationals, such as Panasonic, Epson e Microsoft, on which union negotiations are underway with the aim of limiting the impact. Scenes of a new wave of cuts in the tech sector, which follows that one post Covid, with the common denominator of choices taken on the other side of the globe fell on Italy. However, our labor laws set a barrier compared to other countries, such as the USA, where it is easier to make the workforce slim down overnight.
The effect of artificial intelligence
Among the factors the effect of artificial intelligenceincreasingly intense competition in the sector, “green policies” and digitalisation impacting the use and sales of devices such as printers. The unions are managing in fact redundancy plans which concern tech giants headquartered in Milan, the capital of the sector, where offices, administration and commercial structures are concentrated: Panasonic, Epson e Microsoft. Layoffs of some of the employees which will have an impact on the Milanese area. “We hope to reach a union agreement – explains a trade unionist who is dealing with the negotiations – through incentives for leaving”. Panasonicwith Italian headquarters in viale Fulvio Testi in Milan, last May he put on the table a maxi-global restructuring operation with the liquidation of loss-making businesses and the cutting of 10 thousand employees worldwide. A crisis of the electronics giant that would be linked in particular to the decline in sales of televisions and other devices, also due to Chinese competition, with the consequent choice to concentrate on other branches. A global cut which therefore resulted in the opening of a collective dismissal procedure in Milan, which concerns around twenty employees.
Microsoft ed Epson
A similar procedure was opened by Microsoft Italy and Epsona brand famous for its printers. A product which, in the wake of digitalisation, is less and less in demand on the market, with a crisis also affecting HP, another historic printer manufacturer. In general, functions that, as in Microsoft, can be replaced by artificial intelligence programs are also being cut.
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It then opens a new wave of layoffs in tech giants, after the one that followed the pandemic. Chain redundancies, between 2022 and 2023, causing the workforce to lose weight which had swollen during the health emergency which had given a new boost to technology. It was she who opened the dance Meta-Facebook, then Salesforce, Yahoo, the French multinational video game company Ubisoft which left the Assago business center, just to name a few cases. Also Microsoft at that time it had presented a collective dismissal procedure in Italy for 59 out of 1,080 employees, now followed by a new cut plan. Procedures which, in most cases, had been managed by the unions through agreements, exit incentives and other tools. The same dynamics will recur in 2025 and a new game is now underway, yet to be defined. In the risk of the Milanese occupation the 35 redundancies are also included Paramount Italiawith decisive cuts in the USA which in this case affect the world of cinema and entertainment.
