Wizja TV sacks more staff

Wizja TV, one of Poland's top two digital platforms that is set to merge with former rival Cyfra+, laid off an unspecified number of employees last week, the Business Journal has learned.

The firings follow in the wake of 30 redundancies on Nov. 16, when Wizja TV, owned by Amsterdam-based United Pan-Europe Communications (UPC), closed down Wizja Sport, its locally produced sports channel. According to a source who asked not be named, Wizja last week sacked workers employed in the platform's IT department and Kraków-based research arm, although the company refused to confirm how many people were made redundant. The source also said that all of the displaced IT workers are to be employed with similar remuneration in a Polish computer company. "We have started the reorganization process in the company, which partly stems from the necessity to adapt to new market conditions and partly results from the merger (with Cyfra+)," said Dorota Zawadzka, head of the communications department at Wizja TV. "Some people will be moved to UPC Telewizja Kablowa (Poland's cable TV network owned by UPC), some may be employed on the new platform (digital platform resulting from the pending merger of Wizja TV and Cyfra+) and some will lose their jobs. But we will try to offer them the best possible severance package, including compensation and outplacement."

While the source said that some of the laid-off employees were surprised by the cuts, others had been expecting them. "Many people, including the management, were informed about the situation even a couple of weeks ago," the source said. "Those laid off in December will get one more month's salary apart from due compensation. And it's not only the merger (with Cyfra+) that triggered the layoffs. Without the merger, things could have been even worse."

The merger deal between Vivendi Group, owner of Cyfra+, Poland's No. 2 digital platform (in terms of subscribers) and No. 1 Wizja TV, was signed in mid-August and is expected to solve the financial problems of the two platforms. Following the announcement of UPC's second-quarter results a week later, the company announced that it would sack up to 500 employees from its Eastern European operations within three to six months, and 1,000 from its Western European offices. But according to unconfirmed information, Wizja TV delayed massive layoffs until mid-November when the Polish competition office officially approved the merger.

For UPC's part, immediately after the merger deal was announced, Bert Holtkamp, the company's director of corporate communications, said there would be no substantial layoffs at Wizja, and a number of the platform's employees would survive the merger. Christian Kozar, president of Vivendi-owned Canal+ Polska, operator of Cyfra+, also said there would not be big changes as a result of the merger. "We will need people from Wizja who know their customers, so for the moment there is no concern that they will have to look for a job," he said.

Anna Kocinska