ABS-CBN, PLDT start laying off hundreds

The two largest multi-media companies, Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. and ABS-CBN Corp., announced they will lay off hundreds of employees as they enter into the digital era, the next battleground for broadcasting and telecommunication.

ABS-CBN Corp., the broadcast network of the Lopez group, has an ongoing “voluntary retirement” offer to employees nationwide, as the company shifts into digital from analog services.

ABS-CBN chief finance officer Rolando Valdueza said less than 200 employees would be affected nationwide during the ongoing digitalization of the company.

The network currently has about 8,500 employees, including those of units ABS-CBN Global and Sky Cable Inc.

“Look at this way, we are going to digital and you need skills, competencies going to digital from analog. So, there were employees that would rather retire,” Valdueza said.

“We will need new skills, those guys who have digital know-how,” he said.

Valdueza said the aim of the retirement offer was not to reduce costs, but rather “to get people as we prepare for the shift into digital services.” He said the company’s offer was “reasonable and very fair to the employee.”

The Philippines adopted Japan’s ISDB-T for digital TV migration.

Meanwhile, PLDT said it would cut about 5 percent to 6 percent of its workforce of 17,496 employees as of end-2014. “This is part of our efforts to align the skills and expertise of our workforce with the changing requirements of our business. Some old skills are no longer needed or no longer needed as mush as before,” PLDT spokesman Ramon Isberto said.

Isberto said some new skills were very much needed, especially those for IT and digital services. The country’s largest telecom company recently made changes in senior positions, after core profit fell 5 percent and revenues stagnated in the first quarter.

“It’s very clear that we cannot think and behave like a telco of the past. I think we have started to realize that we have to get people who have the experience, exposure and the skill sets that could bring us there,” PLDT chairman Manuel Pangilinan said.

“As they say, it is either we pivot or we perish,” he said.

Globe Telecom Inc. spokesperson Yolly Crisanto said the company had no similar workforce reduction program. “No, strategically we have planned ahead in terms of our transformation efforts. We saw the shifting needs of our customers way ahead that’s why we’ve gained momentum in delivering services that suit the digital lifestyle of Filipinos,” she said.

Globe president and chief executive Ernest Cu said while other companies were saying that digital transition was “painful”, it was “fun” for Globe. –Darwin G. Amojelar, Manila Standard Today