European rebuff forces Dataflex to cut back

Modem company Dataflex has been forced to make 12 of its staff redundant after admitting it has failed to make an impact on the European PC market.

Jacob van Houbt, managing director at Dataflex, blamed the redundancies on an increase in red tape when dealing with the European market, as well as on the company?s inability to complete an internet project on time.

Van Houbt said Dataflex has been unable to generate enough products to remain competitive in the European market. ?Unless you can produce 50,000 a month you cannot compete,? he said. ?The cost is too high.?

He added: ?We haven?t been able to secure enough customers although there is a big market in Europe.?

A source close to the company confirmed the situation: ?The PC business is dying. It couldn?t compete on price.?

The source said: ?Unless you are producing half a million PCs a month you can?t compete against the huge companies.?

Among the Dataflex redundancies were John Evans, product marketing manager and Keith Davies, IT manager. There were also cuts among technical support and engineering staff .

Van Houbt said: ?With the internet project there were high expectations to have something new, but it was taking too long.?

He added that while the company is cutting back in the European PC market, Dataflex will concentrate on its industrial OEM business.

?The company will not invest in Europe for PCs for the next year, but we will see what is happening in a year?s time,? said van Houbt.