Adobe Systems Inc, the largest maker of graphic-design software, plans to eliminate 750 jobs as it lessens its focus on older products and shifts investment to programs for digital publishing and Web advertising.
The job cuts, mostly in North America and Europe, will cost between US$87 million and US$94 million before taxes, the company said in a statement on Tuesday. That includes US$73 million to US$78 million in charges for the fiscal fourth quarter, which ends on Dec. 2. After costs, net income will be US$0.30 to US$0.38 a share, compared with the previous forecast of US$0.41 to US$0.50.
Adobe is facing competition from Apple Inc and Microsoft Corp, and an industry shift away from its Flash technology for Internet programming. To cope with the changes, the California-based company is adapting its products in an effort to gain ground in the market for tools that use the increasingly popular HTML5 programming language and software for cloud computing, which is -delivered over the Internet.
The company also said it would channel research and development, sales and marketing investments into digital media and marketing in its next fiscal year, and expects less licensing revenue from software for corporate servers. As a result, Adobe said sales would increase from 4 percent to 6 percent next year. Analysts surveyed by Bloomberg had expected sales to increase 9 percent to US$4.53 billion.
The company is overhauling the way it sells its most popular software, called Creative Suite, to spur more frequent purchases of programs like Photoshop and Dreamweaver. As more customers seek to buy and use software over the Internet, Adobe plans to release a software package called Creative Cloud early next year.
The company also reiterated its fourth-quarter guidance for sales and profit on Tuesday. Revenue will be between US$1.08 billion and US$1.13 billion, and profit excluding certain costs will be US$0.57 to US$0.64 a share, Adobe said in September when it reported its third-quarter results.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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