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Jobs are set to be axed at pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline as part of plans to increase cost savings by £1 billion, it has been confirmed.
The firm, which employees 100,000 people worldwide, was unable to say how many jobs would go, only that it planned to increase annual cost reductions by 2011 from £700 million to £1.7 billion.
AstraZeneca also recently announced that 6,000 jobs would be cut by 2013 – this is as well as the 9,000 already announced since 2007.
Rumours suggest that Glaxo, which has sites in Middlesex, Kent, Cumbria and Ayrshire, is to cut 10,000 staff worldwide.
Since 2007, 10,000 jobs have been axed, 2,000 of which were in the UK, and last autumn it announced the closure of its Dartford plant in Kent, where 820 staff are employed.
Glaxo said: “We are very conscious of the effect this programme will inevitably have on our employees and if options exist where we can achieve our financial goals and preserve jobs, we will do everything we can to do so.
“Where no other option aside from redundancy exists, we will support those employees affected in every way we can.”
Copyright Press Association 2009
