HOLLYWOOD - Implementing the biggest cost-cutting measures in its history, MTV Networks said Monday that it will fire about 450 employees, representing nearly 10 percent of its entire workforce. A spokesman said that the employees will receive their pink slips by Friday of this week and that all of them will receive severance pay. In an additional move to reduce expenses, MTV's online unit, MTVi, is being folded into the MTV cable operations and will cease to exist.
In a memo to company staff, MTV Networks chief Tom Freston said: "These moves are being made in light of many changes in our company and in our industry, and in view of the new economic times."