Vodafone plans to lay off thousands of workers in Germany

According to the statement made by the company, a comprehensive savings and restructuring program has been launched by Vodafone in Germany.

This practice will directly affect almost 1 in every 5 employees of the company, which has approximately 12 thousand employees. The company plans to lay off approximately 2,300 employees or shift some positions to other units in the next two years.

Aiming to simplify the structure after customer losses, the company plans to bring corporate processes, sales and customer services to a more integrated structure with the support of artificial intelligence.

Layoffs will be particularly concentrated in management, administrative staff and duplicate structures left over from the past Unitymedia acquisition.

Vodafone Germany Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Marcel de Groot stated that the market is changing at an unprecedented pace and competition is getting tougher, and evaluated that "Methods that worked in the past do not guarantee our success in the future."

Despite the personnel reduction, the company aims to transfer the savings from operational costs to growth areas such as fiber infrastructure, cloud computing, corporate security and digital customer channels.

On the other hand, increasing competition in the German telecommunications market following the change in the cable TV law forces other companies to make savings.

O2 Telefonica, one of Vodafone's competitors, similarly announced that it would part ways with its 1,100 employees and close 60 stores by the end of this year.