It will be a long time yet before Apt Data Services Ltd starts buying new furniture while perfectly serviceable second-hand desks and chairs are to be had at a fraction the price, and Philips Electronics NV, which closed so many facilities over that past few years that it must have spare fittings enough to last it a couple of decades, has woken up to the fact that when times are hard, you don’t spend scarce money on frills: the company is to stop buying furniture for this year, and hopes to save $16.5m – and yes, Reuter reports that the staff newspaper Philips Courier said on Friday that job losses had left the company with a mountain of surplus furniture, so there was really no need to buy anything new.
