A Shannon company has confirmed plans to cut its workforce by over a third with the loss of 64 jobs.
A total of 57 jobs are to be lost in IT company Avocent’s Shannon office and a further 7 staff face redundancy in Dublin.
The impact of the restructuring announced this morning will result in a reduction in jobs in Shannon from 160 to 103. The functions of Avocent’s Dublin office will also be transferred to the US.
In a statement, the company said: “These measures as part of a series of actions designed to enhance competitiveness, improve efficiency and reduce the company’s cost structure across its European locations.
“The reductions will affect certain research and development, marketing and technical support functions as well as the transfer of Asia operations from Shannon, Ireland to the company’s recently established regional hub in Singapore.”
Fine Gael TD for Clare Joe Carey called the lay-offs another "hammer blow to the south west."
"Avocent is a global hi-tech IT management solutions company which has been a good employer in the area. This will have a huge knock-on effect on the local economy," he said.
"The mid west is currently being hung out to dry, and much of it is due to the Government's inept handling of the Shannon to Heathrow crisis. The cost of doing business continues to escalate, while the region still lacks essential infrastructure."
The party's spokesman on enterprise Leo Varadkar said the layoffs indicated that the cost of doing business in Ireland is now out of control.
"The loss of any job is disturbing, but these lay-offs at Avocent are particularly grim news. These high-value jobs in R&D, marketing and technical support are the sort of positions we are supposed to be promoting in Ireland," he said.
"But the most disturbing aspect is that these jobs are going east and west to the US and Singapore, two traditionally high-cost locations. For Ireland to be less competitive than Singapore shows that the cost of doing business in Ireland is now out of control."