AOL cuts 900 jobs worldwide, 20 pct of work force

AOL said Thursday it will slash 900 jobs worldwide, or nearly 20 percent of its work force, partly to eliminate overlap that stems from its recent purchase of The Huffington Post.

About 200 of the cuts are from AOL's content and technology departments in the U.S. The remaining 700 are at AOL's offices in India, which mainly provides back-office support to the U.S. But AOL spokesman Graham James said 300 of those will move to other companies that are taking over support functions.

Thursday's cuts leave AOL with 3,500 employees in the U.S. and about 500 overseas. The total work force is a fifth of what the company had at its peak in 2004, when its staff numbered more than 20,000.

AOL was once the king of dial-up online access known for its ubiquitous CD-ROMs and "You've got mail" greeting in its inboxes. These days, it has been struggling to reinvent itself as a company focused on advertising and content. AOL paid $315 million for The Huffington Post as part of its efforts to become a go-to source for news and other content. That deal closed Monday.

AOL CEO Tim Armstrong, speaking at a conference in New York, said the company has no immediate plans for further layoffs. But he added, "in our situation we don't have the luxury of long-term planning."

Armstrong said AOL will hire this year and will try to have more full-time journalists in its ranks to rely less on freelancers. He said about half the staff now is in content-producing roles, and he wants to increase that to 70 percent.

Shares of AOL gained 1 cent to $19.35 in morning trading Thursday.