Philips in labor dispute

Philips, which has been caught up in a labor dispute over the sale of its mobile phone business, is rushing to clear up bad news.

On the afternoon of the 15th, Guo Liwei, senior vice president and general manager of Philips China Consumer Electronics, told the "First Financial Daily": "In fact, if we act in full accordance with relevant Chinese laws, Philips does not need to compensate for seniority. But for the interests of our employees and the future development of the Philips mobile phone brand, we will still do this."

In addition, he completely denied doubts about the temporary transfer of mobile phone equity, seniority and compensation, and said that the transaction There will be no embarrassment similar to Siemens mobile phone business due to temporary disputes.

Denied doubts

With the sale of the mobile phone business to China Electronics Group (hereinafter referred to as "CEC"), the public found that Philips suddenly began to transfer the equity of the business, that is, from Philips (China) Investment Co., Ltd. to a temporary Transition company Philips Electronics (Shanghai) Co., Ltd. (PESC), and then PESC planned the sale.

Therefore, some employees of Philips' mobile phone business believe that this is a temporary "shelling scheme" used by the company to avoid labor laws, which will cause them to change from employees of foreign companies to employees of state-owned enterprises without receiving a penny of compensation from foreign companies. Especially seniority compensation.

"We are not trying to avoid anything," Guo Liwei said. Equity transfer is actually a common practice in the process of mergers and acquisitions. The purpose is to minimize the "uncertainty" in the process of mergers and acquisitions and complete transactions quickly and effectively , not related to employee placement.

Tang Shaogui, Communications Director of Philips Electronics China Group, explained that the wireless business is only a sub-business of Philips and is scattered in many regions around the world. If each region is integrated with CEC alone, the cycle will be very long. Therefore, the integration of fragmented businesses into PESC can speed up the merger process.

Guo Liwei said that in the transfer agreement, the company has clear terms such as seniority payment and three-month compensation. He said Philips could not pay seniority compensation if it acted strictly in accordance with the law, because the entire transfer did not involve layoffs. He also said that the plan proposed by Philips has been approved by CEC and Shanghai Labor and Social Security Law Center.

The employee also revealed that the company can only get one and a half months of compensation for three months, because the other half depends on the sales performance after the transfer to CEC (the retail sales of 200,000 yuan must be completed in November and December). And there is a precondition: no resignation is allowed during the period.

Guo Liwei said that the reason why half of the compensation is linked to performance is mainly for the sustainable and stable development of the mobile phone business during the merger stage. In fact, he said, performance metrics linked to compensation were significantly lower than they had been in the past, and judging from the performance of the last two weeks, employees had done "very well".

However, the employees believe that the sale of the department and the change of the company's legal person are equivalent to the termination of the labor contract, and the compensation metal should not be regarded as an incentive bonus with additional realization conditions.

Selling employees without authorization?

The employees still insist that if they go according to the company's transfer plan, they will be sold without getting any money. They said the company transfer agreement was filled with coercion.

Zhang Ying, a lawyer at Beijing Braun Law Firm, said that the Philips Employee Transfer Agreement contains many unlawful provisions, and the language is full of coercion. For example, Philips obviously only has the right to dispose of the property, but it obviously regards the employees of the mobile phone business as its own property and tries to transfer it all. Therefore, it can be considered that this agreement is a "decoy notice", which is intended to get rid of the liability for liquidated damages.

Guo Liwei said that Philips never forced employees to sign transfer agreements. On the contrary, the company fully respects employees' right to choose, and they can freely choose to sign or not sign. The reason why everyone is encouraged to sign the agreement is mainly because Philips and CEC have cooperated for more than 10 years, and both sides are full of trust. For some employees who are unwilling to sign the agreement, he believes that this is "hoping to get a one-time salary payment and then change jobs".

Some Philips GSM employees expressed another concern: they signed the agreement with Philips manpower outsourcing companies "Shanghai Lili" and "Shanghai Zhengdong", not Philips. Therefore, after transferring to CEC, once the rights and interests are accepted damage, and safeguarding rights and interests will be more complicated. Currently, they are trying to get outsourcing companies to compensate.

However, the reporter did not find any information about "Shanghai Lili" in the Shanghai 114 service hotline. A person from "Shanghai Zhengdong" Manpower Co., Ltd. admitted that they did provide manpower "dispatch" services for Philips, that is, they recruited them and sent them to Philips. He said that this part of the manpower does not belong to Philips employees in terms of personnel relations. But he declined to say whether they were responsible for the employees involved in the labor dispute.

Related Links

Philips China has had labor turmoil for a long time

This is the second major labor turmoil that Philips China has encountered in the past two years.

In December 2004, Suzhou Philips Display Factory was sold to TPV. At that time, some workers believed that the operator had completely deprived the workers of their right to know, and had damaged the compensation they deserved in the original agreement, causing labor disputes at the company's Guangdong Dongguan Display Factory.