Olympus' new Chief Executive Officer Bob White is shaking up the Tokyo-based medical devices maker after a difficult period that included the ouster of his predecessor in a drug scandal.
Five months into the role, White unveiled a plan to cut about 2,000 jobs — about 7% of its global work force — and an overhaul of the company’s region-centric structure to streamline operations and boost productivity. Olympus is also reviewing its supply chain, as it aims to cut costs by ¥24 billion ($157 million).
Olympus had duplications "everywhere” — from finance and quality control to marketing and human resources — due to its regional setup, White stated in an interview. "We hadn’t globalized our core functions,” he said. "We just had a lot of people doing really good work, but they were doing fragmented work.”
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