Inside Samsung's office: Staff tense, nerves jangle over Note 7 crisis

The next few weeks are traditionally a tense time at Samsung Electronics Co as executives wait to see if their work over the year is rewarded with promotion at the South Korean firm's annual performance review.

This year, that tension has been ramped up several notches as the year-end ritual comes on the heels of the debacle over Samsung's flagship Galaxy Note 7 smartphone.

The world's top smartphone maker this month pulled the plug on the near-$900 device after phones overheated and caught fire. With some replacement phones suffering the same problem, Samsung has forecast a $5.4 billion hit to its operating profits. Some analysts predict the smartphone business may post a first quarterly loss for July-September.

"Everyone's afraid to be heard even breathing," said one Samsung employee. "There will be punitive measures; someone will have to take responsibility for this."

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Twitter plans to cut about 300 more jobs, say reports

Twitter Inc may cut eight per cent of its workforce or about 300 people, Bloomberg reported on Monday, citing people it said were familiar with the matter.

The job cuts could be announced before the company reports third-quarter earnings on Thursday, and the number of jobs affected could change, Bloomberg said.

A company spokeswoman declined to comment.

Last year, Twitter announced plans to lay off up to 336 employees, or about eight per cent of its workforce, a week after Jack Dorsey, its co-founder who had been serving as interim chief executive, took over as permanent CEO.

Twitter, which last month hired bankers to field acquisition offers, faces an uncertain future after Salesforce.com Inc, the last of the companies believed to be interested in buying the company, said it would not make a bid.

With a market cap of about $12.76 billion and losses running at about $400 million a year, Twitter was likely judged too expensive by prospective buyers.

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