Wal-Mart lays off 30 execs

Retailing giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc said Wednesday it has laid off some 30 senior executives in its China unit in an effort to "streamline and simplify" its business, Bloomberg reported.

The departure of these executives is "consistent with actions taken over the last several months," Ray Bracy, Wal-Mart's China spokesman, said in an e-mail reply to Bloomberg.

This is not the first time Wal-Mart has decided to downsize its workforce in China. In March this year, employees at Wal-Mart store in Changde, Central China's Hunan Province, launched a protest as they were unsatisfied with the company's employee resettlement plan, news portal 163.com reported Wednesday.