Digital Equipment Corp France is preparing to outsource all of its information services activity except facilities management and network integration, says a report in Les Echos. In a downsizing project that could affect up to 350 people, the company expects to divide its other service businesses between GFI Informatique SA, Lyon-based Cegid Informatique SA and the FLS Group. GFI will take on its systems integration activity, which comprises 120 people and has $13.6m in revenues, Cegid its personal computer maintenance business worth between $20m and $30m and FLS its computer repair business. The paper quotes Marc Armand, CFDT union representative, that it’s hard to see how Digital [France] will survive such a dismantling, adding that no other DEC subsidiary has eliminated its systems integration business. Les Echos says DEC France chief Didier Ruffat has, for the moment, put off presenting the restructuring plan to the company, awaiting to verify if it will bring the company back into the black in 1998.
