Aircraft giant Boeing Co (NYSE:BA) is set to slash more than 4,500 jobs this year as airline customers rein in new orders.
The Chicago-based group is tipped to shed most of the roles in its commercial jet arm, which has been hit by a fall-off in demand for new planes.
Boeing has had success with its new 787 Dreamliner including an order from Nordic budget carrier Norwegian last October for 19 787-9s.
The deal, worth more than US$5bn at catalogue prices, was the largest single order for 787-9s from a European airline
Also in October, it reported a 9% rise in revenue to US$25.8bn due to record commercial deliveries and a US$485bn order book, equating to nearly 5,700 commercial jets.
But airlines are taking a breather from buying new aircraft after a spending spree that has led to record order books at Boeing and its arch-rival Airbus (EPA:AIR).
Investec said in a note on the sector earlier this year that the outlook for the commercial aerospace sector was becoming more challenging in 2016.
The broker said traffic growth may start to slow and the lucrative after-sales market had still not recovered.
Airbus has had its own problems, with lacklustre demand for its A380 'superjumbo' and delays to its new generation A320neo single-aisle and A350 wide-body jet programmes.
Boeing said about 1,600 positions will go through voluntary redundancies while the rest will take place through attrition, BBC News cited a company spokesman as saying.
Commercial aircraft staff and hundreds of executives and managers are thought likely to take the brunt of the cuts.
Boeing vowed to try to avoid resorting to compulsory redundancies.
The cuts are reported to make up almost 3% of Boeing's workforce, which included 161,000 people at the end of last year.
Boeing delivered a record 762 jets last year, topping its previous forecast.
It had an order backlog of about 5,795 at the end of last year, representing more than seven-and-a-half years of production at the current rate.
Airlines have been resisting spending more cash on aircraft they would not receive for several years, given that Boeing and Airbus are running at full capacity.