Uwe Klimach, a spokesman for Nici, said the company was laying off 99 workers and would not renew the temporary contracts of 24 more.

Klimach said all of the jobs would go in Germany, effective September 30. Nici has 576 employees worldwide, 500 of them in Germany.

Nici, based in the Bavarian town of Altenkunstadt, filed for bankruptcy last month.

A week later, its former head confessed to defrauding banks and other financial firms of at least euro40.5 million (US$51 million).

Ottmar Pfaff's lawyer has said his client confessed to fraud dating back to 2000.

He said Pfaff had taken the money in an attempt to keep Nici-which holds the exclusive European rights to produce the World Cup's stuffed lion Mascot, Goleo- from collapsing.