Bloomberg to Cut Foreign-Language Channels

NEW YORK: Financial news provider Bloomberg is cutting some 100 radio and TV jobs and is said to be eliminating its foreign-language services, shifting its focus to a single English-language international channel.

The layoffs—reflecting just 1-percent of Bloomberg’s global workforce—are the first for the company since its founding in 1981. The cuts come at its U.S. operation and as well as in Europe and Japan. Judith Czelusniak, a spokeswoman at the company, is quoted as saying: "It is a restructuring really needed in order to make programing changes and a network that really leverages our global bureau system and infrastructure." Meanwhile, there are said to be plans to hire up to 1,000 employees in the next year in order to beef up the company’s text-based services.

The move sees the shuttering of foreign-language channels in Japan, Spain and France, among other territories, in place of one English-language channel for the international market. According to Reuters, Andy Lack, the CEO of Bloomberg’s multimedia group, told employees: "In addition to the benefits of approaching our television news reporting as a single global operation, we will be able to make better use of our resources and eliminate duplicative efforts across the channels," he said.