14 DAY TRIAL // Communications company Sprint Nextel is ready to send thousands of employees home as the company's new CEO Dan Hesse is trying to convince its investors that cutting cost is the company's priority. This is not the first incident of this kind, as Sprint has cut about 5,000 jobs. The company reported last year that it had an estimative number of 60,000 employees. The exact number of employees that will be sent home this time has not been disclosed yet.
Sprint-Nextel is one of the top three mobile communications company in the United States, situated behind AT&T and Verizon Wireless. The company had an extremely poor performance during the last year, and investors are pressuring the company to return to profitability. The former CEO, Gary Forsee, has been kicked out of the company back in October.
Customers are very disappointed with the company's performance, especially those who had worked with the Nextel network before Sprint acquired it. The company counts less and less customers, as they leave for other service providers.
Hesse was appointed Sprint CEO after a period he had been working for a company spin-off called Embarq. He promised that he would find a viable solution to return the company to profit. Shedding thousands of jobs might be just the prelude to a series of drastic measures in setting the company back on its track.
It is highly likely for the company to move to its headquarters in Overland Park, Kansas. At the moment, the decisions making takes place in ex-Nextel's base camp in Reston, a facility that shelters about 4500 employees. The vast majority of 13,000 employees are working in Kansas. However, concentrating the company's executive staff in the same compound won't perform miracles.
There are still some unsolved issues that needs addressing, such as the new WiMax network that pierced a 5 billion hole into the company's budget. The network is expected to become operational in the first cities as of April this year. Under Gary Forsee's rule, Sprint promised it will build the WiMax network, but it is under debate whether Sprint will finish it or just wash their hands off.