Thomson Reuters to cut 3,200 jobs in next two years

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Thomson Reuters Corp said on Tuesday that it will cut its workforce by 12 percent in the next two years, axing 3,200 jobs, as part of a plan to streamline the business and reduce costs.

The news and information provider announced the cuts during an investor day in Toronto, in which it outlined its future strategy and growth plans.

The company declined to say where the job cuts were being made. However, Co-Chief Operating Officer Neil Masterson told investors that staff had already been informed about 90 percent of the planned cuts.

The company aims to grow annual sales by 3.5 percent to 4.5 percent by 2020, excluding the impact of any acquisitions. CEO Jim Smith said it plans to cross-sell more products to existing customers and to attract new customers. The company will also cut the number of products it sells, he said.

“We're going to simplify the company in every way that we can, working on sales effectiveness and on ways to make it easier both for our customers to do business with us and for our frontline troops to navigate inside the organization,” he said.

As part of the streamlining, the company said it planned to reduce the number of offices around the world by 30 percent to 133 locations by 2020.

Following the partial sale of its Financial and Risk unit to private equity firm Blackstone, about 43 percent of Thomson Reuters revenues come from its legal business, with 23 percent of sales coming from corporate clients and 15 percent of sales coming from its tax business. Reuters News accounts for only six percent of sales.

Thomson Reuters set a target to reduce its capital expenditure to between seven percent and eight percent of revenue in 2020 from 10 percent currently.

The company has set aside two billion U.S. dollars of the 17-billion-U.S.-dollar proceeds from the Blackstone deal to make purchases to help grow its legal and tax businesses.

Shares in Thomson Reuters have risen by 40 percent since May, benefiting from the company buying back 10 billion U.S. dollars' worth of shares.

Source(s): Reuters