XO fires 600 workers

XO Communications announced it would lay off 8% of its workforce—about 600 jobs—in an effort to cut expenses and meet expectations for third quarter 2001.

The cuts will come mainly from staff support areas and will not have a significant impact on XO’s sales, customer service or network provisioning staffs, said company officials. However, one of the areas most affected will be XO’s new market construction team—which is responsible for building out the company’s national data networks—as XO has cut back its expansion plans and completed most of its scheduled buildouts for the year.

“We deeply regret taking this action given the impact on some of our employees, but we are convinced that it can be accomplished without affecting our ability to win customers and meet their telecommunications needs,” XO Chairman and CEO Dan Akerson said in a statement.

Akerson added the company is now switching from a “network construction posture” to one focused on operations. Details of this realignment will be released during its third-quarter briefing in October.

—Kevin Fitchard, staff writer