InfoSpace cuts work force by 21 percent
The technology platform provider announces the cuts as the company struggles to align its falling revenues with expenses.
InfoSpace, which last week announced its revenues would fall by about a third from Wall Street's expectations for the coming year, said it would cut 250 of its 1,200 global work force.
The company said it will give further details on its restructuring plans in the next three weeks and revised financial estimates for 2001 and 2002.
The cuts come as the technology platform provider tries to transition its business toward the faster growing wireless and broadband focus and away from its slower growing consumer business, which accounts for more than half of its revenues.
"As part of the final integration of Go2Net and our renewed focus on our strongest growth areas, we have re-examined the business and its needs," Chief Operating Officer Ed Belsheim said in a statement.
The Go2Net acquisition last year provided the company with the broadband technology it had been seeking.
InfoSpace shares fell in after-hours trading to $4.07. The company ended its regular session down 56 cents, or about 12 percent, at $4.25.
Last month, InfoSpace shares took a steep hit after the company announced a management shakeup that resulted in the resignations of its chief executive, chief financial officer and chief operating officer.
The chief executive, Arun Sarin, had previously served as head of U.S. and Asia operations for Vodafone-Air Touch and was considered instrumental to developing InfoSpace's wireless restructuring.
Company founder and Chairman Naveen Jain has assumed the CEO post and said Sarin's departure was based on his decision to remain in the Bay Area, rather than relocate to the company's Bellevue, Wash., headquarters. Sarin declined comment.
InfoSpace's stock dropped in light of the management shakeup and after the company forecasted expected revenues this year to reach slightly more than $200 million. Wall Street analysts lowered their expectations from more than $300 million.