Dell Technologies said to cut at least 2,000 jobs after EMC deal

Dell Technologies will cut 2,000 to 3,000 jobs after acquiring EMC Corp. in the largest technology acquisition ever, according to people familiar with the company’s plans.

Most of the cuts will come in the U.S. and in areas such as supply chain and general and administrative positions, as well as some marketing jobs, said the people, who asked not to be named because the dismissals aren’t public yet. Dell is looking for cost savings of about $1.7 billion in the first 18 months after the transaction but is largely focused on using the deal to boost sales by several times that amount, the people added. The new company has 140,000 employees. Dave Farmer, spokesman for Dell, declined to comment.

The acquisition, valued at about $67 billion when it was first announced almost a year ago, brings together the leading provider of data-storage products and one of the top makers of servers and personal computers. Both companies have grappled with rising interest in cloud services from rivals such as Amazon.com, Microsoft and Google.

While expanding revenue is the main focus of the deal, Dell Founder Michael Dell said Sept. 7 “there are some overlapping functions and that sort of thing — that’s not the primary feature of this, but there is some of that.” He declined to give any estimate for job reductions. Dell is based in Round Rock, Texas and both Dell and the former EMC has several operations in the state.Â