Posted: 16th Jul, 2003 By: MarkJ
Global ISP AOL (America Online) has sacked 50 employees from its Netscape division and simultaneously reorganised its Mozilla open-source website browser team:
"Netscape remains a key part of our multi-brand strategy," AOL spokesman Andrew Weinstein said. "We will continue to support the browser and the portal."
The layoffs mark the latest setback for AOL subsidiary Netscape Communications, which has fought an increasingly lopsided battle with Microsoft for browser market share. Microsoft's Internet Explorer is currently used by more than 90 percent of Web surfers, according to site visitor statistics published by Google.
The layoffs come as the loose Mozilla.org group, which had overseen the open-source development efforts of the Mozilla browser, transforms itself into a nonprofit foundation. The foundation is funded in large part by a $2m (£1.25m) donation from AOL and $300,000 from Lotus founder Mitch Kapor.How things change, it was only this time last year that AOL was still seen holding its Netscape brand up high against Microsoft. More @
ZDNet.