Novartis to cut 2,550 jobs in Switzerland and UK to boost profit
Zurich — Novartis will cut 2,550 jobs in Switzerland and Britain over four years, it said on Tuesday, as the Swiss drugmaker strives to boost profit and focus on new medicines. Switzerland will bear the brunt, with 2,150 cuts planned at four factories and its Swiss-based business services unit. About 400 jobs will also go in Grimsby, northeast England, where the company will close a plant that makes pills. Novartis employs about 124,000 people worldwide. But following the planned spin-off of eyecare unit Alcon in early 2019, that would fall to fewer than 100,000 people by 2022, CEO Vas Narasimhan said. Novartis's network of 66 global factories is operating below capacity after the expiry of patents on high-volume pills such as Diovan for heart disease, he added. As the company shifts to gene therapies and biologics such as arthritis treatment Cosentyx, Narasimhan said the cuts were needed to help him boost the drugs unit's operating margin to about 35% of sales, what he calls...
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