Japan's NEC to Slash 10,000 Jobs

(REUTERS) -- NEC Corp said Thursday it will slash 10,000 jobs, almost one in 10 of its workers, to trim costs after the electronics maker announced a loss of 87 billion yen ($1.11 billion) for the three months to December 31.

The company, which employs 115,840 people worldwide, said it will book a 40 billion yen charge in the business year ending on March 31 to pay for the restructuring.

It blamed its poor performance on tougher competition in the telecoms infrastructure business in Japan from foreign rivals, weak demand for its smartphones and difficulty in expanding operations overseas.

The company, which also cut its forecast for mobile phone sales for the business year to 5 million from 6.5 million, said 7,000 of the job losses would be in Japan.

Shares of NEC finished unchanged from Wednesday's close at 168 yen. In the past year its shares have plummeted 32 percent. The company announced its results and restructuring plan after the market closed.

($1 = 78.2250 Japanese yen)

(Reporting by Tim Kelly and Nobuhiro Kubo; Editing by Michael Watson)