SunEdison layoff affects more than 1000 employees

SunEdison Inc., a solar company announced Monday about its plans to optimize its business operations and increase cash flow. This move will include layoffs, according to an internal company memo.

The solar company that makes multimillion-making dollar investments and taking a hit in the stock market aid on Monday that it will turn to markets with high-profit potential, including the U.S., India, China, and Latin America while "rationalizing" purchased services to trim costs and get economies of scale, St. Louis Business Journal reported.

The company will simplify its business structure by 'removing duplicative activities' which resulted from recent collaboration and acquisition activities and business growth through centralization of business development and operations. This also includes the consolidation of its global support teams such as finance and legal, officials said.

"Overall, the proposed changes result in an overall reduction of about 30%, 20% being from non-labor expenses and about 10% from headcount reduction. And this process will take some time to complete. Most of the changes will be announced during the fourth quarter with some final steps expected in the first quarter of 2016," reads the memo, as reported by the Greentech Media.

The layoff had reached all the way to the VP level, excluding the executive level. Sources within the company feel worried and surprised that the cuts didn't affect the architects of the Vivint acquisition. The comment requested for the specifics was not responded by the company.

The company experienced different situations all of the same time. The recent obtainment has almost doubled SunEdison's debt load and added negative operating cash flow. The purchase of Vivint adds to the investors' skepticism as it wasn't an obvious fit with SunEdison's culture and traditional business of manufacturing large solar-power plants.

Although SunEdison is removing some of its workforces, the cut will not affect its Hawaiin operation as confirmed by the company's office in the Islands spokeswoman to Pacific Business News. The Hawaiian operation has 35 employees.

SunEdison's development plans in Hawaii remain on track and looks forward to beginning construction later this year on 112-megawatts of solar power to supply Oahu ratepayers with clean, low-cost renewable energy, according to Kua.

Three out of five of SunEdison's solar farms were approved by the Hawaii Public Utilities Commission. The solar farms approved were the 49-megawatt Kawailoa Solar project in Waialua at its existing wind farm on Oahu's North Shore, the 14.7-megawatt Mililani South PV II project in Central Oahu and the 46-megawatt Waiawa PV project in Waipio in Central Oahu.