LONDON (Brand Republic) - CNN, the cable news channel, is to lay off 400 staff, or 10% of the workforce, in the wake of the merger of its owner, Time Warner, with internet giant AOL.
A third of the cuts will be made from the channel鈥檚 interactive division, including CNN.com and CNNfn.com. Another third will come from the programming division and the rest of the redundancies will be made throughout the operation.
Staff had been bracing themselves for more severe job cuts after the merger between AOL and Time Warner finally won Federal Communications Commission approval on January 11.
In addition to the job cuts, the station has had to deal with a number of senior resignations. Shelby Coffey III, president of the business and financial news network CNNfn, is leaving. He will be replaced by Ken Jautz, the former managing director of German news and finance channel n-tv which is 50% owned by AOL Time Warner.
Also going is Scott Woelfel, president of CNN Interactive, as a result of CNN鈥檚 decision to integrate its internet divisions with the relevant TV businesses.
Last week Bob Furnad, head of CNN Headline News, announced his retirement. He will be replaced by Teya Ryan, who is currently executive vice-president in charge of operations and productions at CNNfn.
The cuts are not expected to affect CNN鈥檚 operations outside the US. Its international audience is believed to be double that of its domestic audience.
CNN鈥檚 move follows similar cutbacks from rival groups NBC and News Corporation. NBC has axed 600 jobs from its online operations ahead of an anticipated slowdown in advertising sales and a hike in programming costs. News Corp has integrated its websites within the TV networks with which they are affiliated as part of a money-saving exercise.