Adobe slashes 600 jobs worldwide

Australia is not immune from Adobe’s recent job-cutting spate, resulting in the loss of 600 positions across the globe.
According to Peter McAlpine, (pictured) country manager for Adobe Australia, this decision was the result of a global change.“The changes are global and have had an impact on Australia across all of Adobe’s business units,” he said.McAlpine could not disclose the number of job losses that had taken place in Australia, but he added that Adobe employs 50 staff locally, which meant that redundancies were “minimal.”Poor financial results for its fourth quarter meant that the company was forced to undertake a restructuring and subsequent downsizing of its staff. The fourth quarter revenue target range was $925 million to $955 million ($A1.428-1.475 billion), with preliminary results indicating that revenue will fall between $912-915 million ($A1.408-1.412 billion).Adobe also cited weaker-than-expected demand for its new Creative Suite 4 as the main cause for the shortfall in fourth quarter revenue. Among industry circles, CS4 was being hailed as a major release for the company, though this has not translated into major sales.Adobe's senior vice president, John Loiacono, who recently visited Australia, said that some considered CS4 to be merely an “update”, which may explain a reluctance to invest in the product. Shantanu Narayen, president and chief executive officer of Adobe said that the global economic crisis had significantly impacted the company’s revenue during the fourth quarter. “We have taken action to reduce our operating costs and fine-tune the focus of our resources on key strategic priorities.”Adobe currently has 7000 staff around the world and will release its final fourth quarter earnings on 16 December.