NEC To Lay Off 20,000, Exit LCD Businesses

NEC said it would lay off as many as 20,000, employees during the coming year, the company said Friday.

The layoff notices came as part of a nine-month financial report for the period ended Dec. 31. For fiscal 2009, NEC now expects profits to decline from a profit of 15 billion yen ($165.9 million) to a loss of 290 billion yen ($3.02 billion), and sales are expected to decline by 9 percent to 4.2 trillion yen ($46.5 billion), with an operating loss of 30 billion yen ($331.9 million).