Top 10 Layoffs of 2009
Welcome to our third annual list of the pharmaceutical industry's top layoffs. With three mega-mergers in 2009, this was a particularly brutal year for job cuts. Not surprisingly, Pfizer (which purchased Wyeth for $68 billion) and Merck (the new owner of Schering-Plough) came out on top of the list, as the drugmakers work to streamline operations and eliminate redundancies. Noticeably absent from this list are Roche and Genentech, which have yet to formally announce any cuts from their joining.
Figuring heavily in many of these companies cuts is the impending patent cliff, which will see some of the industry's most profitable drugs go off patent in the next few years. That's contributed heavily to a reduction in sales reps jobs, which have disappeared at an alarming rate this year.
The layoffs outlined here are, of course, just the tip of the iceberg. According to staffing firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas, 58,696 pharmaceutical and biotech jobs have been cut through the end of October of this year. That's 15,000 more jobs lost than in all of 2008. You can check out this list of smaller developers that cut jobs this year, and here's a look at larger pharma companies that reduced their headcount but didn't make the top 10. Click here to being the report on the top 10 layoffs of 2009.
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1. Pfizer - 19,500 2. Merck - 16,000 3. Johnson & Johnson - 8,900 4. AstraZeneca - 7,400 5. GlaxoSmithKline - 6,000 |
6. Eli Lilly - 5,500 7. Teva Industries - 1,090 8. Sepracor - 940 9. King Pharmaceuticals - 770 10. Sanofi-Aventis - 750 |
Comments
Roche-Genentech has indeed resulted in job losses. They have closed the Palo Alto site with at least the loss of a 1000 jobs. They have also shuttered their commercial operations group in Nutley, NJ with losses there (I have heard that only a 100 jobs were transferred from NJ to South San Francisco. SO how is it that you report that no jobs were lost? Do you mean no Genentech jobs were lost? Since Roche employees don't count!
I did not mean to imply that Roche was not cutting jobs. The Palo Alto announcement was made in 2008, and this report starts with January 2009 announcements. Additionally, in the course of my research I was unable to find any formal announcements or news reports that outlined how many jobs would be cut in the buyout. Without even a ballpark figure I could not include Roche on the list.
New Jersey (once the Pharma capital)suffers the most with these layoffs thanks to the Pfizer/Wyeth buyout, the Merk/Schering buyout, Sanofi Aventis layoffs, Roche moving most operations to California...
Don't forget the Johnson and Johnson layoffs in NJ also. That's where many of their manufacturing plants are.
I just heard to-day that Bracco diagnostics, eliminated all of their position (retaining 4 or 5 key people)in the NJ area. Can someone confirm on this?
Yes Bracco Research closed down their research facilities in Princeton, but Bracco Diagnostics(where most of the corporate functions go on) is still open.
More than 58,000 jobs (with more to come), now lost. And yet all Big Pharma seems to be able to continue doing is to acquire other companies. And add to the nation's unemployment numbers.
Here's a thought: how about divesting these bloated, inefficient behemoths and creating smaller, nimbler, and more innovative life sciences companies?
It couldn't possibly be worse, and it may in fact be better that what we currently have. Perhaps the scholars who run these companies should consider this.
Cause Big Pharma needs to satisfy the shareholders, besides helping patients is money gain the driver for this process. However, this is not reflected in the share value.....
There is no excuse for perpetuating a broken business model. Even maintaining shareholder value. Doing the same thing over and over again, in spite of the fact that it isn't working, is just plain stupid.
Having said my earlier reply, I do agree with your point, smaller is going to be more vigilant
These Acquisitions will not help the normal people,it will only help big people to increase their Assets
I noticed that Boehringer Ingelheim was not on the list. I was involved in their downsizing at the end of August, 2009 and the number involved there was 860 which would put them at number nine on the list.
As somebody noticed, these big mergers/acquisitions do not make the industry more efficient . Shares are sharply decreasing right before the deal (due to rumours), but do not increase back or at higher value. So, I don't think that (at least smaller, not "informed") investors win. The result is increasing in unemployment and decreasing in the number of drugs available (because they are considered too similar). R&D is also not improving following deals. I noticed that the previous promotional competition now switched to the competition on lay-off-ing: the best in top is that who dismiss more employees. Are governments really outside of this game, with no contribution to?
And how much increase in china have we seen
I bet there is a great increase there.
China owns US!.
The data provided of big pharma lay offs in 2009 is nothing more than how the industry operates to remain competitive. What we see is a matter of survival of the fittest. Mergers, acquisitions, aggresive takeovers are some of the corporate tools to provide for its shareholders. Nevertheless, we have to look further. Those jobs are gone for good to Asia (mainly China and India). Pharmaceutical R&D is critical for a nation to prosper and set new grounds in human health. The knowledge generated in the last 5 decades is now being lost. Knowledge is the greatest wealth a nation can have. Those scientists that are receiving pink slips are not necesarily going to work in their fields anymore, nor improve their skills or knowledge nevertheless contribute to the understanding of human disease and cure. They are merely going to get surviving jobs, to hold on. It is critical that the industry also plans strategically to work sinergistically with the nations they belong to not only to generate profit, but to contribute to human growth. There will be people that will reinvent themselves in new professions,but how they will contribute to the growth of their nations is the question. The greatest discoveries do not necesarily come from the wealthiest places, but as consequence of events based on need, and the ability to have the knowledge to observe understand and find uses. Observing what will happen next is very important to set new strategies on how to proceed in the future of pharmaceutical R&D. Lessons are learned from failures and successes. Last year was tough, however nothing special is in the picture for 2010.
Interesting perspective. I like your comments on the loss of knowledge and loss of the contribution to a nation's prosperity (not just monetarily) and ultimately, to human well being. But in a global economy, can companies really "work sinergistically [sic] with the nations they belong to" since they don't seem to belong to any one nation? I'm not sure it's possible. We shouldn't write this off as "nothing more" than "the industry" trying to remain competitive, and as you say, we have to look further. We have to look further into the consequences of these actions. We should remember, too, that "the industry" is managed by human beings and human beings are free to make choices. These particular human beings made the decision to make a certain amount of profit and market share, to make acquisitions, to manipulate shareholder value, to layoff fellow employees, etc. De-personalizing corporate behavior is a mistake.
You'll find no "official announcements" from Roche because they never made one. In fact they'd like everyone to believe they are adding jobs in the Nutley site (which they are, about 40 odd scientist positions) but their silence on the jobs lost (probably approaching 400+) is deafening.
Oh, that's right, they don't call it "job losses" anyway...in Roche speak it's the "separation process". Call it what you will, but a great many people are filing for unemployment in 2009 and 2010 because of it.
I think the term you're looking for is "right-sizing".
The 750 Sanofi-Aventis layoffs fail to include the 300+ contract workers that they let go.
For sanofi-aventis it also does not include the positions that are being moved "take it or leave it" and the forced retirements in countries where layoffs are not allowed. It is understandable that in survival mode - the position that all the pharmas find themselves in due to the direction of worldwide regulatory agencies and worldwide healthcare reform - that new ways of doing business are needed.
Simply one wishes the companies would be honest, open, direct with their employees.
This transparency is missing and will contribute heavily to the issues of unemployment in the US where there do not appear to be any growing industries.
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