BOTHELL – Cingular Wireless has notified nearly 100 Puget Sound area employees of their impending layoff, and more job cuts are expected as Cingular combines its operations with the former AT&T Wireless.
After its acquisition of Redmond-based AT&T Wireless was completed in the fall, Cingular’s chief executive officer said the company wouldn’t begin layoffs until 2005. The first notices went out Monday, the first workday of the new year.
A notice filed with the state indicates that 98 employees in Bothell, Redmond and Seattle were told they would be laid off by early March.
Mark Siegel, a Cingular spokesman, declined to detail how the layoffs would be spread across the three locations. He said most of those affected are in administrative jobs rather than customer service.
He added that Cingular could issue more layoff notices locally in the coming weeks.
Cingular, the nation’s largest wireless company with more than 45 million customers, plans to cut about 10 percent of its work force, or about 7,000 jobs, company executives said last fall.
But Siegel said that the company also will add an unspecified number of jobs in certain departments.
“This merger is about growth and creating growth. We’re not just going to be cutting costs,” he said.
As of 2004, the former AT&T Wireless employed approximately 5,500 people in Washington state, including up to 2,000 in Bothell, which had been home to the company’s information technology department and also houses customer service offices.
In December, Cingular paid more than $134 million for three Bothell buildings previously used by AT&T Wireless. It’s not yet known whether the company will keep operations centers in several other buildings in the Snohomish County portion of Bothell.
It will keep a major presence in the area, however, as Cingular has designated the former Redmond headquarters of AT&T Wireless as its Western region hub.
Reporter Eric Fetters: 425-339-3453 or fetters@heraldnet.com.
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