Amsterdam — Dutch health-technology company Philips may move manufacturing out of the UK in the event of a hard Brexit, as its CEO warned that such an outcome would be a "serious threat" to the viability of its operations in the country. "I am deeply concerned about the competitiveness of our operations in the UK, especially our manufacturing operations," Frans van Houten said. His company became the latest in a lengthening list of big businesses, including Jaguar Land Rover, Airbus and BMW, to warn about the potentially serious consequences of a messy divorce. Van Houten said that additional costs for exports from Philips’s babycare products factory in the UK, under any scenario that did not maintain the single customs union, would amount to the high single digits as a percentage of sales. The company’s plant is in the Suffolk village of Glemsford. Worst-case scenario planning "This is a serious threat to the competitiveness of this factory and we need to do worst-case scenario pla...
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