As Ericsson (NSDQ: ERIC) prepares to trim 4,000 jobs, the Swedish company said Friday that its multimedia division, including TV and music, continues to be in a “build-up phase.” The job cuts follow a 42 percent drop in fourth-quarter profit year-over-year, but Ericsson said the cutbacks primarily have to do with its cellphone network equipment division. It said during the last year, demand for mobile networks slowed and political unrest caused sales to slump in emerging markets.
However, even though the picture is not very rosy, it identifies two bright spots on the horizon — professional services and multimedia. Ericsson’s multimedia division includes services surrounding IPTV, location-based services and mobile TV. It also provides a white-label mobile music service to partners such as Sony (NYSE: SNE) Ericsson and Napster (NSDQ: NAPS). The multimedia division recorded a sales increase of 14 percent year-over-year, and was just below break-even for the full year; the company says it is in “a build-up phase and includes areas with good growth and healthy margins as well as investment areas.”
In the fourth quarter, Ericsson reported profit of 5.6 billion Swedish kronor ($880 million), compared to 9.7 billion kronor ($1.5 billion) in the period a year ago. Sales rose less than 1 percent, to 54.5 billion kronor ($8.6 billion) from 54.2 billion kronor ($8.5 billion) in the quarter a year ago. For the year, sales rose 4 percent to 187.8 billion kronor ($29.5 billion) from 179.8 billion ($28.3 billion) in 2006. Release.
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