In an attempt to recover from the costs incurred by an accounting scandal and recent skirmishes with the UK regulator Ofcom, BT announced it would restructure its global services division.
The overhaul is expected to save the company £300m over two years and see it shed 4,000 jobs.
Following a strategic review of its global services component, the group said it decided a “strategic refocusing” was in order.
“Technology trends mean that we are now less dependent on owning physical local network assets around the world, creating the opportunity to reposition Global Services as a more focused digital business,” chief executive Gavin Patterson commented.
The group will also be accelerating and expanding its cost transformation programmes to offset regulatory and market pressures and create “create the capacity for future investment.”
In its full year review, Patterson admitted that “this has been a challenging year for BT.”
The telecoms firm’s shares slid 3.43% to 301.2p during Thursday morning trading, making it the second worst performer of the FTSE 100 constituents.
Its shares have struggled to recover since its Italian accounting scandal was brought to light, which wiped £8bn off BT’s share price value in January.
In its full-year results, BT reported that profit before tax in the fourth quarter was down 48% to £440m and 19% to £2.35bn for the year overall.
The group paid a final dividend of 10.55p, 10% higher than the year prior, but warned shareholders to expect dividend growth to be 10% lower than anticipated.
