Brace yourselves for another round of pharma layoffs. This time, it's Takeda Pharmaceutical wielding the ax, and the Japanese company is targeting 2,800 job cuts, mostly in Europe, by 2016. The aim: saving $2.6 billion.
The European cutbacks stem directly from last year's €9.6 billion buyout of the Swiss drugmaker Nycomed. That deal left Nycomed's U.S. business intact and independent. But that doesn't mean the U.S. will go unscathed in Takeda's layoff blitz; about 700 positions are targeted in the U.S.
Nor will the cuts leave many operations untouched. The company says it will be laying off workers across the board, in research, administration, operations and commercial functions. Some European subsidiaries may be sold off as Takeda works to integrate Nycomed, and other cuts will be focused on redundant functions. R&D sites will be consolidated.
"The combination of Takeda and Nycomed brought together Takeda's strong presence in the Japanese and U.S. markets with the legacy Nycomed business infrastructure in Europe and high-growth emerging markets," Takeda CEO Yasuchika Hasegawa said in a statement. "There are a number of areas where we will need to make changes to ensure efficient and flexible operations moving forward."
Takeda's announcement comes a week after Novartis ($NVS) said it would cut another 2,000 or so jobs in the U.S., on top of 2,000 positions in Europe and the U.S. that the company previously said it would eliminate. Will the job cuts continue as 2012 advances? As drugmakers continue to integrate recent buyouts—think Sanofi ($SNY) and Genzyme—and lose sales to newly off-patent drugs, our bet is yes.
- read the Takeda release
- see the Reuters news
- get more from Bloomberg
Special Report: Top 10 pharma layoffs of 2011