According to the Nikkei News, Renesas Electronics will lay off nearly 1,000 employees at the end of June to cope with the shrinking domestic market.
The company will primarily provide early retirement benefits to Japanese employees, and the layoff plan is expected to focus on logistics, engineering and other employees aged 35 or older. These layoffs are equivalent to 5% of the Renesas Group's entire workforce and are the first voluntary retirement plans implemented since December 2014.
The crisis caused by the earthquake and tsunami in March 2011 has had a great impact on Renesas. Although the company has been profitable every year since FY2014, the restructuring is still going on. For example, the plan announced in June 2018, according to the plan, Renesas will close the Yamaguchi Prefecture factory within two to three years.
Renesas has used the acquisition to establish overseas operations, including the acquisition of US chipmaker Intersil in February 2017. The chip maker announced last September that it would acquire another US company, Integrated Device Technology, for $6.7 billion. Although the US government partially closed the review process, Renesas is expected to complete the transaction in the first half of 2019.
