Amid Teva’s return to sales growth, the innovative-generic drugs hybrid has been taking steps to cut costs in parallel, with the downsizing push now reaching a U.S. manufacturing facility in the Garden State.
Sixty-one employees who report to the company’s site in Fairfield, New Jersey, are set to be laid off by Feb. 1, 2027, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) filing with the state.
The company has already informed employees of the decision, which comes as Teva has elected to close the production plant at the end of January, a company spokesperson confirmed to Fierce, framing the move as part of the drugmaker’s “ongoing review of our global operations network.”
While efforts have been made to boost production in Fairfield, “the site remains underutilized and costly to operate, while declining demand and price erosion have further impacted its economic viability,” the spokesperson explained.
By mothballing the site, Teva expects it will have more flexibility to focus on higher-priority investment opportunities. At the same time, the spokesperson stressed that Teva’s established U.S. presence isn’t going anywhere, “including in New Jersey, across commercial, R&D, manufacturing, and distribution operations.”
Teva’s broader right-sizing operation falls under the umbrella of the Pivot to Growth strategy it embarked upon when Richard Francis stepped up as CEO in 2023. A renewed focus on innovative drug development, alongside continued commitment to generics and biosimilars, has led to a sustained financial turnaround for the company in recent successive quarters.
But Teva isn’t immune to cost pressures, and as it entered the next “acceleration” phase of its strategy last year, the company telegraphed plans to save some $700 million by 2027, in part by implementing staff cuts to the tune of about 8% of its then-30,000-strong workforce. Apart from the planned cuts, Teva said last May that it would also strive to modernize its operations with tools like artificial intelligence and take steps to optimize its procurement network.
Things have been relatively quiet on the layoff front for the company in 2026, although it was widely reported in June that Teva would cut 250 roles from its active pharmaceutical ingredients (API) business, which it has been seeking to sell since at least January 2024.
At the time of the downsizing announcement last May, Teva clarified that its 8% layoff target was not inclusive of the API business or a generics joint venture with Takeda in Japan that the partners sold in late 2024.
Meanwhile, the wind-down at Fairfield isn’t the only set of layoffs to hit the Tri-state area’s drug manufacturing industry this month.
In early October, Cipla subsidiary InvaGen Pharmaceuticals—which also specializes in production of generic medicines—disclosed more than 200 layoffs across a pair of sites in New York’s Suffolk County, which includes much of Long Island.