No large pharma company has traversed this decade's ups and downs quite like Pfizer. As the company rolls ahead with a large restructuring campaign, some staffers in Ireland will soon feel the effects.
Pfizer is planning to cut up to 210 jobs in Ireland, several local news sources reported Tuesday. A company spokesperson told Fierce Pharma the drugmaker "recently launched a multi-year, multi-phased programme designed to assess the efficiency of our manufacturing, with the initial phase focused on finding operational efficiencies to increase productivity within the network."
This has resulted in the company targeting a "reduction in the number of people supporting our overall manufacturing operations in Ireland."
The proposed cuts are slated to affect certain workers at the company's sites in Grange Castle, Ringaskiddy and Newbridge throughout the remainder of 2024 and into 2025, the spokesperson said.
"Reducing jobs is always the very last resort and we have been doing all we can to reduce costs elsewhere and minimize the impact on our people," Pfizer's spokesperson explained. "We are actively engaging with colleagues and their representatives, and all job-related decisions will be made with transparency, respect, and in compliance with all applicable laws."
The proposed cuts come as Pfizer works through a global campaign to cut costs by $4 billion by the end of 2024. In addition, Pfizer in May revealed a plan to cut additional costs out to 2027.
Pfizer's cost reductions have come in response to dramatic revenue declines in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. After the company's sales peaked in 2022 at around $100 billion, the drugmaker expects to deliver global revenues of $59.5 billion to $62.5 billion this year.
The plan in Ireland follows a separate Pfizer layoff round in the country last fall. In November 2023, Pfizer said it planned to reduce the head count at its plant in Newbridge by 100 employees. The staffers had worked on production of Pfizer’s COVID-19 antiviral Paxlovid, a company spokesperson said at the time.
Over the last year, Pfizer has made headlines for layoffs in multiple U.S. states such as California, Connecticut and North Carolina as well as overseas in places such as the U.K. and Switzerland.
Even as Pfizer plans some cuts in Ireland, the company's spokesperson noted that the drugmaker has invested $9 billion since starting operations there in 1969. In fact, Pfizer is plotting $1.3 billion in expansions at Grange Castle, a project that's expected to "create a substantial number of new roles" by 2027, the spokesperson said.