Nokia completes transfer of 2,300 jobs

The world's largest mobile phone maker Nokia said on Friday that it had finished outsourcing 2,300 engineers to US-based global consulting firm Accenture. "Nokia announced today that it has completed the transaction to outsource its Symbian software development and support activities to Accenture," the company said in a statement. Nokia chief executive Stephen Elop announced in February the company would phase out Symbian as its smartphone platform in favour of a partnership with Microsoft, resulting in the loss of 4,000 jobs and the outsourcing of around 3,000 Symbian developers. The number of outsourced jobs is fewer than the 2,800 that Nokia estimated in June. The engineers will continue to develop Symbian software for Nokia through 2016, according to the company. The news that Nokia and Accenture completed the transfer came just a day after the Finnish mobile phone giant announced it was slashing 3,500 jobs in Romania, Germany and the United States. Those job cuts came on top of the 4,000 Elop announced in April, when he said no more layoffs were expected "for as far as we can see into the future."