March 8 (Reuters) - Japan’s Ricoh Co Ltd plans to cut about 4,000 jobs as early as fiscal year 2019 to streamline its struggling, core office equipment business, the Nikkei reported on Thursday.
Ricoh plans to slash just over 3,000 jobs in Japan by next March, sell a local logistics unit and eliminate management positions in Europe, according to the report. (s.nikkei.com/2tnXlIn)
The layoffs in Europe and Japan represent 4 percent of the company’s total global workforce, the Japanese business daily reported.
Expenses related to the personnel cuts and other restructuring efforts are expected to weigh on the company’s results for fiscal 2018, the Nikkei reported.
Besides, the newspaper said, the company also plans to sell a copier factory in the Chinese industrial hub Shenzhen, and the sale of an equity stake in a Coca-Cola distributor for about 56 billion yen ($528.50 million).
Ricoh will also set aside 200 billion yen for acquisitions of commercial and industrial printing companies as it looks to move away from office printing, the Nikkei reported.
The company did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside regular business hours. ($1 = 105.9600 yen) (Reporting By Rushil Dutta in Bengaluru; Editing by Sai Sachin Ravikumar and Shounak Dasgupta)