It is Tuesday 30th January 2007, the morning after 300 Cork Engineers and managers were invited to a meeting with Senior Motorola Mgt & GSM/UMTS Vice President.
Early yesterday, the vibes were felt through the Cork Motorola Research & Development Engineering and Software development Centre of Excellence. There were tell-tale signs that something amiss was about to happen and that today (Monday) could be The Day.
And so at 12:02pm there was an email received - from Brenda Herold - Cork site manager based in Swindon England-(who since her introduction as Site manager in July 2006 has overseen the a reduction in Cork staff of 122 last year - between Voluntary, involuntary redundancies and resignations).
The email invited all employees in Motorola Cork to a 2:30 meeting.
Congrgated in the Canteen room, at 2:30 the first slide went up - headlining
“Employee Announcement” Cork January 2007.
The 2nd slide mentioned some of the effects that occurred in 2006 - Cork’s UMTS work was transitioned to an external Company in China - to be branded as Motorola. it mentioned the less than favourable results in Q4 of 2006 -
and the last line mentioned ‘consolidation of sites’ which - as I sat in the midst of 300 people, seemed to signal the Alarm bells for me.
The next slide which was almost cryptic - mentioned that all engineering functionality is being taken out of Cork - -And that was it - then Q & A.
Now Cork Motorola centre is first and foremost an Engineering Centre - so taking Engineering out of Cork - seems to indicate everybody. but it was written so cryptically that it still was not certain what was meant - until someone had to ask Brenda - so the entire Cork site is closing ? - to which she replied ‘yes’.
In mid 2006, the Networks & Enterprise section of Motorola - of which Cork is part - was sectioned into newer categories - and Cork in effect from July onwards had 3 divisions internally- a section of the workforce programming for UMTS/GSM, a section programming for Core Switching, and a section working on the CDMA network.
The Core Networks 2 major customers decided not to go with the Motorola Core Switching Softswitch, and UMTS was transitioned to an external company since the end of November.
In November/December, in response primarily to the UMTS work going, Cork workforce was reduced by 60 people, the 2nd layoff of the year - an earlier reduction of 30 had occurred in June ‘06.
In December and January as the work for the Core Switching / Softswitch dried up , it was expected that there would be a workforce reduction by perhaps 80 to 90 people from Cork.
Also in the December / January timeframe, it transpired that in 2007 GSM work would follow a similar pattern to that of UMTS. That would effect a further 60 people in Cork - but there was still ongoing work to do on the current deliverables and that this workforce reduction would probably come later in the year - June or July perhaps.
The AEMS CDMA work was strong in Cork, and even today, has major Motorola customers waiting for this product and deliverables. it would make little sense to stop this work in Cork - work not being done anywhere else in the world by Motorola.
So yesterday at 2:30 when Brenda Herold - over the UMTS/GSM side of the business, announced that she / Motorola was in effect closing Cork site, people were stunned and shocked. The timeframe is march-may. There is first a 30 day ‘cconsultation’ period with employees, afterwhich employees would be handed notice- 4 weeks for most. - so Easter would be close to Closing time here for a centre in existence for 25 years.
And believe me, today the effect is still vibrating through the centre.
Colleagues returned to work this morning, not sure of what the future holds. many have only ever worked in Motorola - here for the past 6, 10, or 17 years. Most have Mortgages, families, roots, lives built aroiund their existence and work environment here. It is time for reflection, decision - a cross-road for many.
What to do now- continue in this type off business - change technology or software dev focus ofr try something else altogether - go teaching, become an archaeologist, a labourer, a property developer, or travel the world.
Tune in, here over the next 2 months for the story & ramblings of how all this unfolds and how a highly skilled engineering workforce of Motorola Cork - transitions into the external world.
Regards,
Siasy.
