AT&T to Cut 12,000 Jobs, Capital Spending

AT&T said today that it will lay off 12,000 employees and reduce capital spending as it seeks to adapt to a tough economy and the shift to wireless technologies. The telecom giant said it plans to reduce its capital expenditures from 2008 levels, and will detail its 2009 spending plans in January.

It's not immediately clear how the cuts in staff and capital spending will affect AT&T's huge data center network, which includes 38 facilities around the world with more than 2.3 million square feet of data center space. Larry Dignan notes that the company's 2008 capital spending is likely to reach $20 billion.

AT&T's data center operations have been the beneficiary of additional capital spending in recent years as the company added infrastructure, citing an "explosive surge in data, voice and video traffic."

Earlier this year it said it would expand its data center space in Boston, Dallas, Singapore and Amsterdam. In 2007 AT&T added  data centers in Toronto and Piscataway, New Jersey, and in late 2006 expanded in Chicago and Shanghai, China. The company's most recent investment has supported the launch of its cloud computing service, Synaptic Hosting.