200 jobs were threatened at IBM in the Herald

Last week, the American IT company IBM announced Dismissal of 1,251 jobs in France, Or a quarter of its staff across the country. This community plan is in addition to the other restructures the company has already announced: global restructuring and the split of a part of the company.

It is this accumulation that worries the unions. According to IBM CFE-CGC Secretary Christian PervagleriWe are talking about 2,200 to 2,300 people affected by layoffs.“

However, the founding of IBM in the Herald was a matter of great pride during the tenure of Georges Frech. Created more than 3,000 jobs In the department in the 1990s, the U.S. company now has the lowest number of employees at 400, which unions say will be halved by the end of 2021.

Departs to focus on the “cloud”

According to IBM France, the official reasons for this employment security plan (BSE) are the economic problems of the French subsidiary. But according to Denise Cross, CGT union representative at IBM, “This is the usual spell. ”

In fact, the trade unionist said that the visit of IBM’s new CEO Arvind Krishna last April played a major role in these reforms.

Mr. Krishna wants to focus on more profitable activities. He has now arrived, so he has to repay the shareholders. For us these are strategic layoffs.

Therefore, the other argument put forward to make more profit is to focus on “cloud”, cloud computing, which requires very few employees. ” Uber that works without cars or like Airpin without hotels“Denise Cross explains.

Less staff, and above all lower costs to the company. “Future IBM employees will be in India, not France. Since it already costs ten times less per employee than France, IBM Emphasizes: “India has suspended its labor code for the next three years, opening the door to multinationals such as IBM“

“Unfair contact” from IBM

These announcements provoke the anger of the assembled unions. Of course, jobs are intimidating, but even IBM Contact “Unfair“According to Denise Cross.

IBM’s communication strategy is paradoxical: we [les représentants syndicaux] Learned the existence of this community program locally last Wednesday; On the other hand, we learned from the press in early October, that the IBM group’s famous split was two. We have not had any information on the matter since then.

Yet this split – or rather “Session“- According to Denise Cross, IBM wants to isolate itself from all its outsourcing areas, such as managing IT tasks.

According to the CGD, this is about 25% of French workers at IBM. “This whole area of ​​outsourcing uses data centers Le Millionaire and Grabels in Montpellierr, Denise Cross explains. So logically, IBM is in a position to affect the hundred jobs they create there.“

A union has been meeting since last week to examine appeals against these various reforms. The unions confirm this: “A real fight is going on. “