Mobile phone maker Sony Ericsson said on Friday it would slash another 2,000 jobs this year to fight a slumping handset market as it posted a big first-quarter loss in line with expectations.

Sony Ericsson, jointly owned by Sweden's Ericsson and Japan's Sony Corp, said it would take an additional 200 million euros in restructuring charges due to its new cost-cutting program.

The firm booked a pretax loss of 370 million euros in the first quarter, after restructuring charges of 12 million euros, compared with the average forecast from analysts for a 371 million euro pretax loss.

Sony Ericsson, the No. 4 global handset maker after Nokia, Samsung and LG, had flagged a steep first-quarter loss in a profit warning last month, when it warned investors it would sell barely half the phones it sold in the fourth quarter.

It shipped 14.5 million units in the first quarter.

The company said sales fell to 1.74 billion euros from 2.7 billion a year ago.

The results came a day after Nokia reported its first-ever quarterly pretax loss, but reassured investors that it saw signs that demand was stabilizing.

The average selling price for Sony Ericsson's handsets in the quarter was 120 euros, in line with analysts' forecast, but down from 121 euros a year earlier.

(Editing by Will Waterman)

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