According to CEO Joe Kaeser in a webcast conference yesterday, the cuts will represent about 3% of the company’s total workforce with 7,600 jobs being cut to pare down the companies divisional structure while 4,000 jobs are deemed unnecessary to regional operations. Some workers will be moved into new departments rather than being made redundant.
“A certain amount of people do stuff for coordinating things, analyzing things,” the executive said. “About 20 percent of those we believe can be put to work elsewhere, but not there. They can be taken out of the system because the work goes away.”
Germans lose jobs as France gets promises
German unions will certainly not like to hear of the planned cuts as Siemens AG (ADR) (OTCMKTS:SIEGY) (FRA:SIE) promised the French government that it would create around 1,000 jobs there and guarantee them for there years if Siemens purchases the energy concerns of Alstom SA (EPA:ALO) which built France’s power grid. That promise was made following a bid by General Electric Company (NYSE:GE) of $17 billion for the same concerns.
It’s is expected that Siemens will counter GE’s bid sometime in the first half of next month and has suggested that it could involve a swap of its trainmaking business for Alstom’s energy assets something that German union representatives have repeatedly said is unacceptable if there are job cuts.
Siemens AG (ADR) (OTCMKTS:SIEGY) (FRA:SIE) is also looking to purchase more of Rolls-Royce Inc.’s energy assets while it has cooled on the idea of purchasing robot-maker KUKA AG (ETR:KU2) prompting the stock to fall over 3% yesterday.
“7,600 people are working for the sector co-ordination, just for the sectors, coordinating a middle level which has gone,” Kaeser said yesterday. “Another 4,000 people were doing a regional cluster analysis, which is not necessarily what the customers were needing to see. So by taking out layers of the organization, we not only give more transparency for our businesses to be closer to the board, but also take work out from in the organization.”
Siemens letter to employees
In a letter today, Kaeser stated that the company would do its best to find work elsewhere for those affected, but made it clear that the reorganization is going to happen in order to make businesses with revenues of around “15 billion” profitable. It’s unsure if he was speaking of euros or dollars.
Siemens AG (ADR) (OTCMKTS:SIEGY) (FRA:SIE) is nearly 170 years old and Kaeser intends to move the company towards digitalization, electrification, and automation while running its health-care concerns separately.
“We do not intend to sell the health-care business but we are flexible in being prepared for anything that comes along,” Kaeser said yesterday.
