NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Job cuts from mergers and acquisitions soared in the first quarter, job search firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas said Wednesday.

Merger-related job cuts jumped to 76,784 in the quarter, nearly six times above the previous quarter and about three times the rate of a year earlier.

And mergers accounted for about 27 percent of all the 287,134 job cuts in the quarter, according to the firm.

The biggest cutting came in the telecom industry, which saw increased M&A activity in the last half of 2004 and the beginning of 2005. Forty-two percent, or 32,380, of the merger-related cuts occurred in telecom, Challenger said.

"Several telecom deals have yet to be finalized, but once they are we can expect to see more fallout, especially since many of these deals were made with the sole purpose of cutting costs," John Challenger, CEO of the firm, said in a statement.

"These (findings) demonstrate how difficult it is to integrate work forces that prior to the merger viewed each other as adversaries, or worse, viewed one another with contempt," he added.

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