Xerox announced that it will be reducing its workforce by 15% as part of a reorganization. This is the latest move made by the corporation to shift its emphasis away from its famous photocopiers and toward its business-services products.
The business said in a press statement published on Wednesday, January 3, that it would be reorganizing its executive team and laying off some of its employees. By the year 2022, the firm reached approximately 23,000 workers worldwide. An anticipated date for the layoffs is in the first quarter of 2024.
Following the announcement of the layoffs, the stock price of the firm dropped by almost 12%, as reported by The New York Times.
With the implementation of a cost-cutting initiative in 2018, Xerox was able to save billions of dollars, which contributed to the company's continuously increasing share price over the last year. Its revenue for the third quarter of 2023 was down around 6% from the same period the previous year, according to reports.
The Highs and Lows
Once known as the Haloid Company, Xerox began operations in 1906. It became famous in the 20th century for making copying machines to the point that the brand "Xerox" became a verb and the general term for any copying machine.
However, after feeling the heat from Japanese rivals like Canon, it shifted its attention to financial services, such as insurance and real estate.
The initiative failed, and the business liquidated itself of those departments in the 1990s. As the need for ink and printed papers has declined in recent years, Xerox has faced challenges in adapting to the digital era.
With a string of unsuccessful movements, the transformation would occur in phases.
Former Xerox CEO Ursula Burns aimed to fortify the company's commercial services by assisting customers in improving the efficiency of their human resources and healthcare document flows and in managing their payment systems. It paid $6.4 billion in 2010 to purchase Affiliated Computer Services, the company behind the electronic highway toll payment system E-ZPass.
Competition from Chinese manufacturers of cartridge-clone makers reduced Xerox's earnings in 2014, and the company sold its IT outsourcing division for over $1 billion. The firm also attempted to get into the 3D printing market, but in August 2023, it divested that division as well.
The announcement of Xerox's merger with the Japanese giant Fujifilm was made public in 2018. Activist shareholders, headed by Carl Icahn, opposed the deal and its undervaluation of Xerox, which led to its cancellation less than three months later.
Xerox also attempted to purchase HP in 2019. However, the transaction was likewise canceled after HP turned it down, stating that they were worried about Xerox's financial stability.
