Closes the Salo factory — Microsoft confirms

Microsoft said Friday that it had concluded retrenchment talks in Finland.

Microsoft has chose to shutter Nokia’s plant in Salo, Finland and has also revealed that it will be axing 2,300 jobs from the country.

The closure of the product development unit marks the end of mobile phone-related operations in Salo, which date back to the mid-1980s.The staff cuts are a effect of weaker-than-expected demand for handsets running Windows Phone.

The latest job cuts, which were initially announced in July, are part of Redmond’s plants to cut 7,800 jobs globally, most of which will be from the phone hardware business that it acquired from Nokia a year ago. Its two remaining sites in the country – one in Espoo, the other in Tampere – will stay open. The unit in Espoo is set to concentrate on the development of high-end smartphones and the unit in Tampere on mid-range smartphones.

After the most recent cuts were announced, Finnish Prime Minister Juha Sipila called Microsoft’s decision “a big blow” and visited Salo to hear from local residents on how the government could best help the town, according to Reuters.

Apart from its team of former Nokia employees, Microsoft also has a sales and marketing team of less than 300 workers in Finland.