(Reuters) – Telefonica told unions on Monday it was seeking to cut around 5,100 jobs in Spain by 2026 in an effort to reduce costs and adapt the company’s size to the current market, a UGT union spokesperson said.

Spain’s largest telecom company employs about 21,000 people in its home country, while its global workforce is more than 103,000.

The company based the decision on productivity, organization and technical reasons, the union spokesman said as Telefonica (NYSE:TEF) and the unions started negotiating the layoffs.

In a statement Telefonica confirmed the labour “adjustment”, but declined to say how many jobs it intended to axe.

Automation and the replacement of the copper network by optic fibre require much less labour, so the company has regularly streamlined its payroll over the past years.

The most recent job-cutting plan, affecting about 2,700 positions, was announced in late 2021.

The company will negotiate the extent of the job cutting with the union, so that the actual cuts could be fewer than the 5,100 ones targeted by the company, UGT spokesperson Diego Gallart said.

The next meeting between unions and the company to negotiate conditions of the layoffs will take place next week.

The cuts are part of the company’s three-year strategic plan to boost profitability by reducing capital expenditure, raising revenue and cutting costs.