Renishaw job cuts

Renishaw has announced that it will cut 500 of its 2,240 global workforce following a significant decline in sales.

Renishaw’s Chris Pockett told The Engineer that the majority of redundancies are likely to be in the UK, however exact figures have yet to be confirmed. The company has 1,450 staff based in Gloucestershire.

The news comes a month after the company persuaded staff to take a 20 per cent pay cut, marking a quarterly saving of around £4.5m in the current year. The latest round of cuts is expected to generate annual savings of around £20m before tax at a one-off cash cost of £8m.

In a trading update, the precision engineering group warned of a £10m operating loss in the second half of the financial year, with monthly profits continuing to fall in both January and February. Sales of measuring equipment had been particularly affected with the group expecting the trend to continue in the short term.

David McMurtry, chairman and chief executive of Renishaw, said that due to the exceptional and unprecedented global recession, the company had been forced to take decisive action to reduce its cost base. He added that the group would continue to invest in products and markets in an effort to overcome the downturn.