Nokia has announced the closure of the last major Western European mobile phone factory, with production ending at its production plant in Salo, Finland, leading to the loss of 780 jobs.
The plant closure is part of a restructuring plan recently announced by Nokia CEO Stephen Elop, which will see the struggling mobile phone maker cut 10,000 jobs from its worldwide workforce.
The news comes against the backdrop of a disastrous second quarter for the phone maker, with the company announcing last week that it had sold just 600,000 handsets in the US during the quarter, including only 300,000 of its Windows Phone 7-based Lumia smartphones.
The figures represent a 60% year-on-year decline, as well as a dramatic fall from the 486,000 handsets the company sold per week in the US during 2006.
Andrew Sadauskas is a former journalist at SmartCompany and a former editor of TechCompany.
