Swedish multinational telecommunications  firm Telia says it will be laying off 3,000 staff across all countries it operates in, or 10 percent of its total workforce, with 160 of these job losses to fall in Estonia.

It remains as yet unclear which positions will be affected by the layoffs, "Aktuaalne kaamera" reported.

Telia Eesti CEO Holger Haljand said upping charges alone was no longer sufficient to allow maintaining investments and developing quality.

Haljand said: "The layoffs will impact on various divisions across the company. We are so interconnected that, whether we are developing something, providing services, or offering something, there aren't any isolated units where we can make cuts in the one place, without affecting others."

Telia said it aims to complete the changes by December 1.

Other companies in the ICT sector set to make significant layoffs this year include gaming company Studioworks, where 168 jobs will be lost, and fintech startup Monese, which previously made 36 lay-offs.

Katrin Liivamets, head of employer services at the Estonian Unemployment Insurance Fund (Töötukassa), noted that the number of unemployed individuals with an ICT background has been growing in Estonia for about five years now.

Whereas the figure was 200-300 in 2019, just over a thousand former ICT staff are currently registered unemployed, she told "Aktuaalne kaamera."

Despite this, the number of ICT job vacancies has remained static and at pre-pandemic levels, leading to increased competition for position a trend confirmed by Margus Eha, CEO of software development company Opus.

"Previously, we had to actively headhunt people, as we got almost no applications for developer positions. Now, we are getting 10 to 20 CVs [per vacancy] for sure," Eha said.

Eha noted that the quality of CVs as received has not improved.

"Good talent is still scarce," he said.

Despite this lack of supply on the job side, annual wage growth in a sector once well-known for providing good average salaries has slowed up also.

"Salary growth in our sector has gone on, but it's not as strong as before. A few years ago, asking for a 20 percent pay rise was commonplace, but now wage growth is more modest, "he added.

Liivamets at the Unemployment Insurance Fund added that experienced and higher-paid workers, too, are finding it harder to secure new jobs, as these are naturally not the cheapest labor sources.

"Firms in tough situations are clearly favoring less experienced employees. It has been harder to find work that matches previous experience in a market where there are more job seekers but fewer job offers," she summarized.

Liivamets also noted that the end of the startup boom has normalized the job market in the ICT sector, aligning it more with other industries.

--

Follow ERR News on Facebook and Twitter and never miss an update!