Qualcomm eyeing to axe 4,700 employees

Qualcomm will lay off 15 percent of its employees, or an estimated 4,700 people, as part of a restructuring plan that may include spinning off non-strategic parts of the company. The mobile giant announced the plan to cut $1.4 billion in annual costs by 2016 along with its quarterly results, which were down significantly but in line with expectations.

Revenues for Qualcomm's fiscal third quarter were $5.8 billion, down $1 billion YoY and $1.1 billion sequentially. Net profit was down a whopping 47 percent from the prior year to $1.2 billion.

Amid an industry slowdown in smartphone growth, the company predicts its fourth quarter revenue would be down 15 to 30 percent from the prior year to $4.7 to $5.7 billion. Qualcomm estimated it will sell 170 to 190 million of its MSM cellphone chipsets in the period, down 19 to 28 percent from last year.

The results amount to the first big downturn for the company that has been a darling of the go-go mobile era. Qualcomm attributed the decline to a decrease in licensing revenues, a burn off in inventory and reduced demand for premium chipsets from a vertical customer - likely Samsung - as well as lower than expected sales in China.

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