Acer Execs Take 30 Percent Pay Cut On Fourth Quarter Losses

Oh, how the mighty have fallen. It seems like a thousand years have gone by since Acer was on top of its game and talking about how it was going to supplant Hewlett-Packard as the world's top PC maker (in terms of shipments). Instead, Lenovo was the one that leapfrogged into first place, while a series of missteps and CEO changes ultimately dragged Acer down to the No. 4 spot. Be that as it may, Acer deserves a bit of kudos.

The company is underachieving and while part of its has to do with the PC market being in a slump, Acer brought most of its financial troubles on its self, starting with the ousting of CEO Gianfranco Lanci, who landed at Lenovo as a consultant. However, rather than announce a series of job cuts, Acer today said that its executives will bear the brunt of responsibility by voluntarily taking a 30 percent pay cut.

Acer Laptop

"Acer acknowledges missteps in the past on resource allocation, and the over expectation of Ultrabooks and notebooks with touch panel. Although the products were leading in design they did not accurately fulfill market needs," Acer said.

Those mistakes led Acer to report a net loss of around $254.79 million in the fourth quarter of 2013. That's not something Acer wants to repeat, so going forward, the company said it will "formulate its product strategy with more caution," as well as pay better attention to inventory.
Tags:  Acer, PC, jobs