AMD to Slash 10% of Jobs in '08

Advanced Micro Devices will shed 10% of its workforce this year and predicts a 15% first-quarter revenue drop, down to $1.5 billion, the Wall Street Journal reports. Slumping desktop sales and the company's line of defective chips and have hurt AMD, which will lay off workers worldwide at "all levels within the company," a spokesman told the San Jose Mercury News today.

The Silicon Valley-based company took on heavy debt in 2006 by acquiring ATI Technologies Inc., then rolled out a line of defective chips in a bid to compete with Intel. Since then, Wall Street has waited for AMD to announce cost-cutting plans, perhaps by outsourcing manufacturing. Company stock traded today at $6.34, an 11-cent increase, but fell to $6.22 after-hours following the announced layoffs. (More AMD stories.)