Mobile chipmaker ST-Ericsson, a joint venture of STMicroelectronics and Ericsson, today announced plans to cut up to 600 more jobs as it unveiled additional cost-cutting procedures. “The company is now targeting additional annualised savings of US$115 million,” it noted in a statement. “These savings are expected to come from reductions in operating expenses and spending, along with an extensive R&D efficiency program. As part of this effort, the company will also conduct a global workforce review which may affect up to an additional 600 employees worldwide.” No specific details were supplied.

The move follows plans announced earlier this year to cut costs by US$230 million and reduce its roughly 8,000 workforce by 1,200. In October the company posted a narrower net loss for the third quarter (US$112 million, compared to a loss of US$213 million in the previous quarter). Net sales came in at US$728 million (up 9 percent from US$666 million in the previous quarter), fuelled by handset vendor demand for its U8500 product (claimed to be the industry’s first open OS 3G/HSPA single chip smartphone platform). ST-Ericsson has also recently boasted of success in China, stating that it has shipped five million TD chipsets (based on the country’s homegrown 3G technology, TD-SCDMA) and is now powering more than 100 models of TD devices. Established in February, the plan was to create a large-scale European entity to compete with larger companies such as Qualcomm and Texas Instruments. A new CEO, Giles Delfassy, is responsible for that goal.