Ingemar Blomqvist has been selected by Ericsson's management team to co-ordinate the company's programme of rationalisation. In Blomqvist's view Ericsson has grown and recruited too rapidly to be able to oversee the organisation, and now the company is paying the price for this rapid expansion. In R&D this scenario is very clear. Today, Ericsson has R&D operations in 60 different places around the world. Blomqvist says:
"It has not always been possible to find the resources where we needed them."
Therefore R&D had to go to where the engineers were. But now, the good times are over and this sprawling organisation has to shrink. However, Ingemar Blomqvist is not ready to say which projects or R&D sections will be hit or how they will be selected.
To become more efficient the company intends to gather much of its R&D in as few places as possible. R&D administration, which to a great extent is based in Kista outside Stockholm, will bear the brunt of the cutbacks.
Gittan Cedervall