US pharmaceutical company, Schering Plough yesterday announced it was to make 161 staff redundant at its plant at Brinny, Co Cork, as part of a strategic review of its operations worldwide.
Workers at the 700 strong plant were told of the decision by management at a meeting at lunch-hour yesterday and the company later said the job losses were mainly related to "decreases in volume for products manufactured or produced at the site".
The job cuts will initially be on a voluntary basis and management will meet unions and employee representatives today to work out specific details of the redundancy package.
In a statement issued yesterday, the company said the job losses will be spread across both manufacturing and administration, and it expects employment at the plant to total 545 following the rationalisation.
The general manager at Brinny, Dr Colman Casey, said the decision to reduce numbers had been made with great regret and the company valued the contribution of every employee who had contributed to the growth of the plant since it opened in 1986.
SIPTU branch secretary Mr Eddie Mullins said he had met with representatives of the 400 SIPTU members at the plant and they were unhappy about the decision to cut so many jobs.
"I met with representatives of the process operators and the analysts, the two groups I represent, and they're disgusted at the announcement.
"They knew something was coming down the track but they didn't expect it was going to be this," he said.
"They're not at all happy with the proposals which would involve 44 per cent of process operators being let go and 30 per cent of analysts, neither of those cuts is going to be acceptable, there's no way the company is going to get that number of voluntary redundancies among those groups."
Yesterday's announcement followed a similar one in January 2004 when the company announced it was cutting 170 jobs at Brinny, while in June 2004, it cut some 76 jobs at its 440 job Rathdrum plant in Co Wicklow.
Both Rathdrum and another Schering Plough plant at Bray, Co Wicklow, which employs nearly 300 people are unaffected by the latest cuts which will leave the company's total workforce in Ireland at approximately 1,200. The plant at Brinny produces Intron A for treatment of chronic hepatitis B and Peg-Intron for chronic hepatitis C, as well as Remicade for the treatment of various forms of arthritis and Crohn's disease.
Last month, the company, which has its headquarters at Kenilworth, New Jersey, reported a fourth quarter loss of $856 million which was due mostly to an $807 million tax provision taken under the US Jobs Creation Act of 2004.
That fourth quarter loss of $856 million compared to a loss of $181 million for the same period in 2003, though revenue for the fourth quarter of 2004 rose by 12 per cent to $2.18 billion.
The company reported strongest sales for Remicade, allergy drug, Clarinex and cancer drugs, Temodar and Caelyx, while its partnership with Merck for the anti-cholesterol drugs Vytorin and Zetia earned it $403 million in combined sales for the quarter.
The fourth quarter figures mean the company reported a net loss for 2004 of $947 million, which included a $119 million charge for employee termination costs.