As part of a plan to restructure itself into a more innovative, efficient, and entrepreneurial business, MySpace announced today that it will reduce its staff by nearly 30%. This restructuring plan crosses all U.S. divisions of the company and lowers the total number of domestic staff at MySpace to 1,000 employees. (TechCrunch)

Cessna Aircraft Co., the nation’s largest builder of corporate jets, is planning another round of layoffs and possibly more furloughs, the company said Thursday.

CEO Jack Pelton sent an e-mail to employees warning them of the coming cuts in the work force and production, but he did not say how many workers will lose their jobs.

“Order cancelations have not stopped. The market for new aircraft remains frozen as customers wait to see if the recovery forecasted comes to fruition,” according to Pelton’s letter, which was posted on The Wichita Eagle’s Web site. (AP)

Scotts Valley-based Seagate Technology announced Wednesday that it will lay off approximately 1,100 members of its global workforce as part of a restructuring for the hard-disk manufacturer.

This is the second heavy-duty round of layoffs this year. In January, the company trimmed 2,950 employees including CEO Bill Watkins and announced that more layoffs were likely to follow. (PressBanner)

HEWLETT-PACKARD Co’s quarterly profit dropped 17 per cent on lighter sales in two key areas, personal computers and printer ink, in a sign that the woes in consumer technology spending have dragged on beyond the miserable holiday season.

The company also said an additional 6,400 workers, or 2 per cent of HP’s 321,000-employee work force, will lose their jobs over the next year. (AsiaOne)

As Finnish cell phone giant Nokia continues to cut costs in an effort to combat declining demand, the company recently told Reuters it would shed an additional 490 jobs in the near future. 170 employees from Nokia’s logistics, production management and production support divisions will be released and the company will extend its Voluntary Resignation Package to 320 workers at its Salo facility. (Boy Genius)

American Express said Monday it will cut 4,000 jobs, or 6% of its global workforce, as part of an $800 million restructuring plan.

Under the plan, the financial services company will also cut investment spending and operating costs.

The 4,000 cuts are on top of the 7,000 positions the company said in October it would eliminate, according to American Express spokeswoman Joanna Lambert. (CNN)

Sony Corp. reported its first annual net loss in 14 years and forecast a bigger loss this year, saying the pressure from sliding sales, competition in gadget prices and a strong yen was expected to continue.

The Japanese electronics and entertainment company said Thursday it lost 165 billion yen ($1.72 billion) in the January-March quarter, compared to a 29 billion yen profit for the same period the previous year. That brought its full fiscal year loss to a 98.9 billion yen ($1 billion). (AP)

General Motors Corp and Chrysler aim to drop as many as 3,000 U.S. dealers and are expected to begin sending notifications as early as Thursday, three people briefed on the still developing plans said.

GM, facing a U.S. government-imposed deadline of June 1 to restructure or file for bankruptcy, is expected to send termination notices to up to 2,000 dealers — a third of its roughly 6,000 U.S. dealers, the sources told Reuters. (Reuters)

MySpace has let go of as many as 45 employees in the last week, we’ve confirmed. Sources close to the company say that the exact figure may be smaller, but that MySpace has definitely laid off a significant number of people. MySpace has refused to comment on the matter, so it isn’t clear if this was the result of a canceled project, general layoffs, or performance-based cuts. A source says that early signs indicate that the open positions will not be filled by other employees. (TechCrunch)

Wells Fargo & Co on Wednesday said it is freezing its cash-balance pension plan for all employees, and has issued layoff notices to 548 workers in uptown Charlotte, North Carolina, the former home of Wachovia Corp.

The moves will reduce costs, spokeswoman Mary Eshet said. Wells Fargo bought Wachovia for $12.5 billion at the end of 2008, and has said it expects about $5 billion of annual cost savings related to the merger, with job cuts beginning this quarter. It has not said how many jobs it plans to cut. (Reuters)