4月19日，英特爾宣布將裁員約1.2萬人。這再次證明，12個月來科技行業從業人員的處境越來越艱難。就業安置機構Challenger, Gray & Christmas的數據顯示，一年來計算機行業的裁員數量已經達到72333人。

該機構估算，2016年前三個月科技公司削減了17002個工作崗位，同比增幅高達148%。

對此，我們只能發出“哎呦”的感嘆。

即將被戴爾收購的VMware和EMC正在為此做準備并壓縮規模，而戴爾也一直在削減成本。

惠普公司（從事PC和打印機業務）和惠普企業（從事數據中心和云服務業務）仍在繼續著母公司幾年前開始的裁員行動。2015年7月，微軟宣布計劃裁員7800人。

IBM似乎也處于半永久性裁員狀態（盡管該公司發言人一直在提醒我們，IBM也會繼續招人）。

Intel’s announcement on Tuesday about cutting 12,000 jobs is just one more example of an increasingly tough 12-month period for tech sector employees. Over the past year, the computer industry has slashed 72,333 jobs, according to job placement firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas.

During the first three months of 2016, tech companies sliced 17,002 jobs. That’s up a whopping 148% compared to the first three months of 2015, according to the company’s calculations.

One word: Yikes.

VMwareand EMCare slimming down as they prepare for their impending acquisition by Dell, which has also been cutting costs.

And both HP Inc. (the PC-and-printer company) and Hewlett-Packard Enterprise(the data center-and-cloud company) continued the job cutting that their parent company started several years ago. Microsoft announced planned layoffs of 7,800 staff last July 2015.

IBMis also in what seems to be a semi-permanent job-cutting mode (although as its spokespeople continually remind us, IBM is also hiring.)

已有幾十年歷史的科技公司正面臨著一項特別的挑戰，原因是公司采購軟硬件的方式已經和以往不同。傳統IT服務供應商已經不能再指望每隔幾年就會準時出現一次軟硬件大規模升級，進而從中獲利。

部分原因在于越來越多的企業（和個人）軟件銷售采用了訂閱模式，以單個用戶為對象，以月為時間單位。同時，這些軟件都安裝并運行在軟件供應商的服務器上，比如Salesforce.com、NetSuite或者Workday。

此外，越來越多的公司開始自行開發軟件，而且可能把這些軟件放在Amazon Web Services或微軟Azure等公共云上運行。上述兩種情況都意味著軟件購買方的數據中心對新硬件的需求不再那么旺盛，也不再那么頻繁。

此外，還得說說開源軟件。使用Linux、OpenStack或其他類似軟件的公司不用支付商業專屬軟件時代隨處可見的高額授權費。正是出于這個原因，甲骨文、微軟和IBM等公司才會一邊應付傳統業務銷售額的下降，一邊爭相邁進這個新時代。

隨著智能手機和平板電腦的使用者越來越多及其應用范圍越來越廣，PC市場陷入了長期滑坡狀態，這給英特爾帶來了沖擊。雖然全球絕大多數PC和筆記本電腦都使用英特爾芯片，但在手機和平板電腦等領域，英特爾并沒有占據類似的主導位置。

正如Challenger, Gray & Christmas首席執行官約翰?查林杰在一份聲明中總結的那樣：“我們一直都需要科技，但我們怎樣跟科技互動，以及何時何地與之互動正在迅速地發生改變。”（財富中文網）

譯者：Charlie

校對：詹妮

Technology companies, which have been around for a few decades, face a particular challenge because businesses are buying hardware and software differently than in the past. A traditional IT provider can no longer count on huge (and profitable) hardware and software upgrades to come every few years like clockwork.

Part of the issue is that more business (and personal) software is sold by subscription, on a per user, per month basis. And, it runs on servers owned and operated by the software provider—by a Salesforce.comor a NetSuiteor a Workday, for example.

In addition, more companies are developing their own software—and perhaps running it— on the shared infrastructure of public clouds like AmazonWeb Services or Microsoft Azure. In both cases, that means the software buyer needs less new hardware less often in their own data centers.

And then there’s the open-source software situation. Companies running Linux or OpenStack or other such software don’t pay the high license fees prevalent in the age of commercial, proprietary software. And that’s why companies like Oracle, Microsoft, and IBM are scrambling to enter this new era while managing declining sales in their older businesses.

Intelhas been bitten by the fact that the market for new PCs is in a prolonged slump as more people rely on smart phones and tablets for more tasks. While Intel’s chips power the vast bulk of the world’s PCs and laptops they are not as dominant in these other devices.

As Challenger, Gray & Christmas chief executive John Challenger summed it up in a statement: “We will always need technology, but how we interact with it, as well as where and when we interact with it , are changing rapidly.”