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Everything Everywhere to cut 1,200 jobs

The company formed from the merger of T-Mobile UK and Orange UK is to cut 7.5 percent of its workforce, including back office, management and IT roles
Written by David Meyer, Contributor

Everything Everywhere, the result of the union between T-Mobile UK and Orange UK, intends to let go 7.5 percent of its workforce.

The company said on Thursday it expected to make 1,200 redundancies from its back office, headquarters and management staff. It described the cuts as "the next stage of its transformation", which began when the UK operations of the two mobile network operators formally merged in July. The merger was announced in September 2009.

"With the size and scale of our combined business, we have an incredible opportunity to deliver an unrivalled experience and unparalleled value to our customers," chief executive Tom Alexander said in a statement. "To do that we need to ensure that we are operating with maximum efficiency, effectively serving our two brands while removing any unnecessary duplication from the business and, above all, making sure that we are set up to deliver for the future.

"It is therefore regrettable that some roles will need to be removed from our combined business. We will of course be doing everything we possibly can to mitigate the personal impact on our people and support them through this process," he said.

The two UK operators have a combined workforce of 16,000 people, and Everything Everywhere has for the last three months been working to identify duplication in those roles. It has not given a timescale for the redundancies.

According to Communication Workers Union (CWU) spokesman Kevin Slocombe, many of those affected are IT workers. He told ZDNet UK on Friday that the union was in discussions with Everything Everywhere over protecting those and other workers' interests.

"Job losses are always concerning, but we're in discussions with the company and hopefully we'll be able to work with them to ensure a successful future both for the company and workers," Slocombe said.

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