back to article Bloodbath as Broadcom slashes through CA Technologies personnel

Broadcom has confirmed to The Register that staff have been axed in its just-acquired CA Technologies business, though declined to reveal numbers. Rumors of mass layoffs emerged this week: first it was feared roughly 300 employees were being let go, and now it may be as many as 2,000 in the US. CA Technologies employed about …

  1. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Only 40% - pah!

    In UK, it will be worse. Of the 373 current employees, only 131 have a long-term future at Broadcom. People will know their fate on Tuesday 13th

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Only 40% - pah!

      UK employee numbers are a third of what they once were. Once they removed the logo and started sharing the UK EMEA headquarters the writing was on the wall.

  2. Potemkine! Silver badge

    Fertilizer Department

    also known as PR, spreading loads of BS

  3. Mark 85
    Mushroom

    Is Broadcom trying to mimic the activist investor model where they suck up money, the IP, and then kill off the payroll to finally finish looting the company and dance on the ashes in celebration?

    1. This post has been deleted by its author

    2. Charlie Clark Silver badge

      Broadcom isn't really Broadcom. It was bought by an investment company which just adopted the brand. So, everyone should have seen this coming. No doubt the entrails of CA will subsequently be put up for sale.

    3. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Broadcom is really Avago which is really Silver Lake, the VC guys.

      I suggest you read a few of Hock Tan's investors' meetings. His goal is to buy a company, sell off all the parts that don't meet his profit targets and which do not dominate their market segment if he can. He takes the remnants and cuts them to the level where they can support what remains and the (bare) necessary to keep that business going. He's not one on research and new business lines, just on continued development of what profitable business lines he has. In that sense he's much like Cisco in the 90s when their approach to research was to buy smaller rivals who looked like they might have a good idea.

      It's an extremely efficient business machine. Many might say it's not very humane, and you won't see anything particularly new and innovative come out of a machine like that. But looking at the profit margins it achieves, it's what investors want these days.

      This works in an environment of low inflation and cheap credit like we have today. We've seen a similar period in the 60s that led to many conglomerates of less related companies. Periods of higher interest rates tended to leave those conglomerate models struggling, though, so investors might well sour on Broadcom if rates rise and Broadcom is forced to depend more on internal innovation rather than acquisitions to grow.

      1. Grinning Bandicoot

        And we are the cause

        Those of us that have invested in mutual funds and have retirement plans being funded through stocks make our choices on ROI in the near term. The wonderful government which by its nature must think conservatively due its fiduciary duty demands that R&D especially blue sky research be discounted furthering this mindset that encourages this behavior and we the investors march right along in screwing the future! If there was an honest, viable way to treat pure research on a balance sheet and if applied research was treated as overhead rather then a cost center these types of corporate rape would no longer be as viable. Thank you T. Boone Pickens

      2. katrinab Silver badge

        Maybe next year's numbers will look good, but will they make profits for long enough to cover the cost of the investment. My guess is no, these companies usually go under about 5 years later, and they are not making anything like 20% income yield.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Plan A

    When your company has been bought, get your CV out immediately. After the blood bath, the prospective new employers will be buried in applications and by that time it is too late. Employers rarely have any loyalty to the employees and it is only reasonable to reciprocate. I got out immediately last time the whiff of mega death could be felt. and I am glad I did.

  5. Dave Pickles

    As ye sow, so shall ye reap

    CA, under their former name of Computer Associates, had (allegedly) a reputation as asset-strippers in the 1990s. Maybe now it's their turn.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

      1. Buy up-and-coming software company, giving founders the pay day they are probably desperate for.

      2. As soon as purchase is finalised, make half the staff redundant.

      3. Jack up licence fees, hoping that most customers are too dependant on the software to switch.

      4. Software development slows down, gets integrated into anonymously-named buzzword of the week enterprise suite thing.

      5. More redundancies? Why not.

      6. Goto 1.

      1. Charlie Clark Silver badge

        Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

        I think you're missing a step before 6: sell off carcass to like-minded group (tax efficient) or float it, if you think the cretins have returned to the market.

      2. Kabukiwookie

        Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

        Indeed.

        CA, where good software goes to die.

        1. 2Nick3

          Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

          "CA, where good software goes to die."

          Good, bad, mediocre, and every type between. Did anything they touch improve or flourish?

          1. Anonymous Coward
            Anonymous Coward

            Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

            Actually ours did improve and flourish, but admittedly this was a rare occurrence.

      3. Destroy All Monsters Silver badge

        Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

        Jack up licence fees, hoping that most customers are too dependant on the software to switch.

        Software development slows down, gets integrated into anonymously-named buzzword of the week enterprise suite thing.

        This is what Atlassian does and they haven't even been bought.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

          This is what Atlassian does and they haven't even been bought.

          Yet. The world of enterprise software is always consolidating. Their turn will come.

    2. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

      Yup. The buyer bit.

    3. david 136

      Re: As ye sow, so shall ye reap

      Couldn't happen to a nicer company.

      When they bought ASK, Wang said, "You lost. We bought you cheap."

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not Remotely Funny

    Another word on the demographics of those shaft^H^H^H^H^Haffected - inside information indicates that if you just happened to be a remote worker your future is limited.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    What they don’t want you to know is that CA Technologies had to lay off a large portion of the US workforce just to make the Broadcom deal viable. So although 2000 is a very large number, the actual number impacted by this horrendous Broadcom deal that benefited no one except Broadcom and Mike Gregoire is much, much larger.

    Yes, I am one of those let go pre-merger. Makes me angry, yes, but doesn’t make my statement any less true.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      I had friends cut pre merger

      They were very good and generating real value/money.

      So I guess CA/Broadcom hate money.

  8. EveryTime

    It's incomprehensible that a company can be worth paying $19B, and then you immediately discard 40%.

    Cutting 10% risks leaving a company in crisis. Unless you are closing an isolated factory, cutting 40% leaves a company non-functional.

    Companies are notoriously bad at figuring out what is 'fat' when cutting 5%. They'll cut a guy putting in 6 hour days on the off-season, then be short of people at the end of the quarter. There isn't any way that a 40% cut can be done wisely.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Broadcom bought CA for one thing only, the mainframe software division. This generates 55% of the revenue from 35% of the staff, but more importantly 90% of the profit. Follow the money people. If you work in other than the mainframe or automation BUs, then you are living on borrowed time.

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Not all WARNings work

    "Some hard numbers will go public soon, since US states like California and New York have public Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) registers, meaning large companies have to publicly declare their layoffs."

    Except that companies are masters of blowing holes in this. They use tricks like trickling out the layoffs over a period of time to avoid crossing the reporting threshold. IBM are the total masters of this, I would imagine that Broadcom and CA's HR departments are well capable of this too.

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