NTT sends 80% of staff back home with eye on COVID variant

Hitachi, Nippon Yusen and Mitsubishi Estate also go remote

20210426N Tokyo commuter

Pedestrians at a crossing in Shibuya ward, Tokyo: New, more infectious variants of the coronavirus are driving a surge in cases in Japan. © Reuters

YUJI NITTA, Nikkei staff writer

TOKYO -- Nippon Telegraph & Telephone and other major corporations are telling large swaths of their workers to stay home after Tokyo, Osaka and two other prefectures entered a new coronavirus state of emergency on Sunday.

NTT will cap the percentage of back-office employees who come in to the office at 20%. The company had set a 50% limit during Japan's first COVID-19 state of emergency declared in April 2020, and 30% in the second, imposed in January.

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