BT cancels Concert

NEWS BT and AT&T have finally drawn a line through loss-making venture Concert, with the loss 2,300 jobs worldwide. The closure will cost BT £1.2bn in redundancies and restructuring costs and exceptional charges of around £200m. The job cuts represent around 40 per cent of Concert's workforce. The remaining workers will be assimilated back into BT and AT&T. Around 800 of the 1,000 people the business employs in the UK are expected to go. Concert was launched in July 1998 to much fanfare but soon turned into a money pit. Its closure marks the further consolidation of the cash-strapped telco by chairman Sir Christopher Bland and its continuing withdrawal from the global telecoms arena.