JAPANESE company Sony Corporation has postponed plans to expand production at its plant in Nitra, western Slovakia. The company was responding to what it said were considerable changes in the global economic environment, the SITA newswire reported on December 9.
“With regard to the ongoing rapid fall in demand in the market for television sets, Sony has decided to postpone its recently planed investments to expand production in the plant in Nitra, Slovakia,” the company explained in a press release.
Sony had originally planned to invest approximately €167 million to boost production of LCD TVs by approximately 2 million pieces annually. It had planned to hire 2,700 people in Slovakia.
The corporation is also sacking 8,000 people in its plants worldwide. In Nitra, Sony is now laying off seasonal workers. Spokesperson Helena Windisch described the move as standard practice every year after the peak season ends. She said that production of TV sets has a seasonal character, increasing at the end of the year and decreasing at the beginning of the following year.
