DHAKA: Panasonic will pull out of the smartphone market in Japan and pare its smartphone operations to outsourced production in emerging markets like India.

The company’s president said on Wednesday, reports The Straits Times.

The Japanese electronics company, which has suffered US$15 billion in losses over its latest two financial years, is staking its turnaround on a transformation from a consumer gadget maker to a supplier for other businesses.

The architect of this turnaround plan, Panasonic president Kazuhiro Tsuga, has warned he would weed out any division that fails to meet a 5 percent operating margin goal within three years.

Tsuga told media in an interview that the company’s mobile division was likely to lose more than the 1.1 billion yen targeted loss for the financial year ending next March. Panasonic’s mobile division posted an 8.1 billion yen loss last year.

BDST: 1732 HRS, SEPT 04, 2013
RoR/GCP