Drug giant Pfizer is cutting more manufacturing jobs in Ireland as the company continues to struggle with the post-Covid landscape in the pharmaceuticals sector.
It is understood that up to 210 jobs will go across three sites – Grange Castle, in west Dublin; Newbridge, Co Kildare; and Ringaskiddy, Co Cork. That amounts to just under 5 per cent of the group’s manufacturing workforce in Ireland.
Some of the redundancies will happen before the end of this year with the balance taking place in 2025. The company, which employs around 5,000 people across five plants in Ireland, said it was “actively engaging with colleagues and their representatives” after making the decision to shed jobs in Ireland.
Asked whether any redundancies would be voluntary, the company indicated that some compulsory redundancies were likely as part of the process.
“We will work locally and consult with colleagues through this process which, in some cases. will include a voluntary aspect,” a company spokeswoman said.
The redundancies come on the day Minister for Public Expenditure and Reform, Paschal Donohoe, announced an additional allocation of €30 million for new medicines in Budget 2025.
Pfizer has spent much of the past 12 months engaged in a $3.5 billion-$4 billion “cost-improvement programme aligned with the longer-term revenue projections” for the business.
In May, it announced a second round of cost savings, looking to trim a further $1.5 billion in operating expenses by the end of 2027. Announcing that second round to cuts, the company said the focus would be on “operational efficiencies, network structure changes, and product portfolio enhancements”.
The job cuts are the second among Pfizer’s Irish workforce in the past 12 months. The company shed 100 staff from its Newbridge site late last year in response to a global collapse in sales of its Paxlovid Covid antiviral medicine.
Newbridge and Ringaskiddy are both heavily involved in the production of Paxlovid. The Cork plant makes the active ingredient for the medicine which is made into tablet form in Newbridge and other finishing plants across Europe.
Pfizer has also struggled to catch up with rivals Novo Nordisk and Eli Lilly in the rapidly-growing obesity therapy sector.
“Pfizer recently launched a multi-year, multi-phased programme designed to assess the efficiency of our manufacturing focused on finding operational efficiencies to increase productivity within the network,” a spokeswoman for the group’s Irish business said.
“As part of this process, we’ve conducted a series of evaluations and have proposed a reduction in the number of people supporting our overall manufacturing operations in Ireland. These proposals impact colleagues across the Grange Castle, Ringaskiddy and Newbridge sites during the last quarter of 2024 and into 2025.
“Reducing jobs is always the very last resort and we have been doing all we can to reduce costs elsewhere and minimise the impact on our people,” the spokeswoman added. “All job-related decisions will be made with transparency, respect and in compliance with all applicable laws.”
Pfizer noted it had invested $9 billion in its Irish operations since first coming to Ireland in 1969. It said that plans for the $1.3 billion expansion of its Grange Castle site will continue in a move that will see a “substantial number of new roles at the site by 2027″.
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