IBM Closes Its R＆D Department in China, Affecting Over A Thousand People

IBM has confirmed that it will completely shut down its research and development department in China, affecting more than 1,000 employees. The closure of this R&D department involves two main business lines: the IBM China Development Lab (CDL) and the IBM China System Lab (CSL), which are primarily responsible for research, development, and testing. IBM will offer affected employees compensation equivalent to N+3. In response to news about the layoffs in the R&D department, IBM China stated: ‘IBM will adjust its operations as needed to provide the best service to customers, and these changes will not affect our ability to support customers in Greater China.’

Last Saturday (the 24th), some media quoted IBM China employees saying that the company had closed the access rights of the research and testing staff in China on Friday evening (the 23rd). A technical employee from the lab stated that before the access was revoked, the company employees were going about their work as usual and there were no warnings or ‘signals’; some technical staff were even in the middle of overtime.

These employees have been removed from the product group of the communication software and cannot log into the company’s intranet via VPN, but can still access email. IBM China has multiple subsidiaries, and the employees whose permissions were revoked belong to IBMV, which includes CDL (IBM China Development Center) and CSL (IBM China Systems Center), mainly responsible for research, development, and testing.

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