Ricoh to Cut 13% of French Workforce

PARIS -- Japanese office equipment and digital camera maker Ricoh will cut 338 jobs in France, some 13% of its workforce in the country, union officials said Thursday.

"The management told us it intends to cut 338 posts among the 2,500 the company has in France," said CGT union representative Thang Doan following a meeting with company officials.

Hit hard by the 2008-09 global financial crisis and stiff competition, Ricoh announced two years ago that it planned to shed 10,000 jobs, a tenth of its global workforce, with the first major wave of cuts to take place in 2014.

Ricoh France spokesman, Eric Baudart, said the reorganization "is aimed at safeguarding the competitiveness" of the world's top office equipment manufacturer.

Fierce competition has squeezed margins on photocopiers "and we've arrived at the point where the company can't support the further collapse of margins," he added.

Doan said two previous rounds of job cuts since 2010 had seen over 200 employees leave the company in France.