EMI to slash 1,500 jobs

EMI is to stop making its own CDs with the loss of 1,500 jobs.

It will also axe one in five of its artists as part of a huge cost-cutting programme.

The company behind Coldplay, Robbie Williams and Norah Jones has been hit by the illegal downloading of music on the internet and declining album sales.

EMI, which has its headquarters in Kensington, said that 'very few' of the jobs would be lost in Britain.

Artists being dropped include a large number of American new wave bands and Continental European performers who are little known outside their domestic markets.

A spokeswoman refused to say whether any major artists faced the chop, adding that the cuts were among 'under-performing and niche acts'.

This is the second round of cuts in both jobs and artists by EMI in less than three years. It has already slashed 1,900 jobs and two years ago chopped its artist list by 200 acts to 1,400.

Today's cuts take its list to just over 1,000 acts. EMI said the roster was being 'rebalanced to focus resources and effort more effectively on the artists who have the greatest potential on both a global and local level'.

A number of record labels will be merged, including the new wave Higher Octave with Narada and the Christian music labels Sparrow and Forefront.

The largest cuts will see 900 jobs go at the CD-making plants in Uden, the Netherlands, and Jacksonville, Illinois. EMI will outsource the manufacture of both CDs and DVDs. The other 600 jobs go across the music group, with Europe likely to bear the brunt, reflecting recent poor sales of albums.

The last huge round of cost-cutting by EMI followed the arrival of Alain Levy in 2001 who was recruited to turn around its recorded music arm.

He decided to end Mariah Carey's contract at a cost of $28m (£16m). Her first album for EMI, Glitter, was released on 11 September and suffered poor sales. Since then EMI has been in on/off merger talks with the other main players in a declining industry.

Last autumn it failed in a £1bn bid to merge with Warner Music and now faces stiffer competition when Germany's BMG and Sony Music complete their planned merger.

EMI said today's cuts would cost it £75m in one-off charges like redundancy but should save it about £50m a year in the medium term.