Microsoft Confirms Finnish Phone Site Closure and Job Cuts

The plant was taken over from Nokia as a part of Microsoft's acquisition of Nokia's mobile phone sector, reported Xinhua news agency.

Microsoft confirmed that as a result of the retrenchment negotiations completed in Finland on Friday, about 2,300 of 3,200 jobs will be slashed and the operation of the Salo plant will be transferred to other Finnish cities.

The company said it will concentrate on its phone business in Espoo and Tampere after the closure of the Salo plant.

Microsoft announced in July that it was about to cut a total of 7,800 jobs around the world, most of which were from the phone business bought from Nokia more than one year ago.

Microsoft launched its largest-ever layoffs of 18,000 employees in July 2014. The company currently has nearly 118,600 workers worldwide (March 2015).

Earlier this week, Microsoft said in lawsuit that InterDigital has violated US antitrust law by failing to keep its promise to fairly license its technology considered essential to mobile phone communications.

The complaint against InterDigital, filed in federal court in Wilmington, Delaware, deepens a long-standing fight over patent licensing between the two companies.

It comes as the US International Trade Commission is set to rule this month on whether Microsoft smartphones should be banned from being imported into the United States for infringing two of InterDigital's patents. Wilmington is the home base of InterDigital, which makes money through the licensing of patents.

Written with agency inputs