FT prepares to cut 80 staff

by John Reynolds, mediaweek.co.uk 12-Jan-09, 15:55

LONDON - The Financial Times group is planning to make up to 80 people redundant across its global operations.

Chief executive John Ridding told staff in an e-mail today that the redundancies will hit several departments, but did not give specific details of which areas the job cuts would impact.

Ridding said: "We are now taking the next steps in reorganising and streamlining our business. We are deepening integration in our print and digital operations, combining some operations with our recent acquisitions and simplifying some of our processes to increase efficiency and deploy resources in line with our objectives."

Affected staff will be contacted by tomorrow, Ridding added.

Ridding also outlined to staff key priorities for 2009, which include further investment in FT.com and the launch of new digital publications, including a Chinese business report and a digital edition of How To Spend It magazine.

Additionally, the business title, owned by Pearson group, plans to grow its Middle East edition and its Chinese language operations.