IBM will slash 5,000 U.S. employees, outsourcing many of their job positions to India. The new cuts will hit the global business-services unit.
Outsourcing is nothing new for Big Blue: already about 71 percent of its workforce lies outside the United States.
The news, reported by the Wall Street Journal, comes amid talk of an IBM-Sun Microsystems merger, and after a fourth quarter that saw a 12 percent gain in earnings to total $4.5 billion.
IBM has already made 4,600 job cuts this year, and expects to spend about $300 million to $400 million to pay out severance.
