EarthLink Inc. plans to cut 900 employees, almost half its workers, after subscribers fled the unprofitable U.S. Internet service provider. The company’s shares rose the most in two years.

EarthLink said today it will close or scale back offices in five states this year, cutting the Atlanta-based company’s workforce to about 1,000 employees. The firings will cost as much as $70 million in the next two quarters. EarthLink also trimmed its sales forecast for the year.

Chief Executive Officer Rolla Huff is shrinking the company after it shed 1 million subscribers in the past year. EarthLink has reported four straight quarterly losses as spending on new wireless services buoys costs. The growth of its high-speed wireless products hasn’t offset subscriber losses for dial-up Internet service, its original business.

source: bloomberg

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 28th, 2007 at 6:28 pm and is filed under Interesting Stuff. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.