Lucent Technologies lays around one hundred occupations off on the Riviera

The telecom manufacturer on the Riviera has stopped the activities of its research and development center of Nice-Arénas and transfers its call center from Sophia to Ireland.

Lucent Technologies reduces its ambitions by one third in the Alpes-Maritimes. Layoff processes decided on the international scale (more than 10.000 jobs over 125.000) have repercussions on the French Riviera. The telecom manufacturer in distress counts more than 300 employees spread over two sites : Nice-Arénas (the former Octel company bought up by the American giant around three years ago) and Sophia Antipolis.The first site to be hit by this layoff process is the Nice site. The activities of the former Octel (a research and development center linked to unified messaging systems) are stopped. All the positions (around 70 engineers and technicians), as a result, have been cut out, while premises (2.000 m2) are put on the market back. In Sophia Antipolis, cuts are intended to the call center. The one which will be transferred to Ireland, what represents around forty jobs deleted in the research park. These layoff processes should be over June 15th 2001.Lucent which, last year, announced the creation of 300 additional jobs in the Alpes-Maritimes, will have a staff of less than 200 people. On the other hand, the company keeps on betting on its UMTS incubator. It is under way of setting up in the 3.000 m2 of the Algorithmes building in Sophia Antipolis, a space left free by Sema Group which is now set up in its own building. Managed by Cicom Organisation, the incubator was composed of 15 to 20 start-ups which were working on the future services of the third generation mobile phones. Thus, such companies will come to strengthen Lucent strategy in the new activities which are thought as buoyant in the future : voice recognition, multimedia diffusion, customer relation management, etc.