Europe Just Got Hit With a Massive Wave of Auto Job Cuts
It’s a tough day for the European auto industry. Just hours after Jaguar Land Rover said it may cut up to 5,000 jobs in its primarily U.K.-based workforce on Thursday, Ford f announced it will also eliminate thousands of jobs across Europe.
Jaguar Land Rover, owned by Indian conglomerate Tata Motors ttm , has seen a decline in sales in China as well as a drop in diesel sales in Europe, Reuters reports. The company already cut 1,000 jobs last year, but new plans to improve cash flow by £2.5 billion ($3.2 billion) include “substantial” cuts to employment that will run into the thousands, a source told Reuters, affecting managerial, research, sales and design staff, but not line workers.
The BBC reports up to 5,000 employees could be cut at the company. Jaguar Land Rover employs about 44,000 people in Britain and in the past few years hired thousands of workers at new plants in China and Slovakia. But it’s also spent millions of pounds trying to prepare for Brexit, which could have a disastrous effect on its European sales.
Meanwhile, Ford Europe announced today it will be cutting thousands of jobs from its workforce, which currently totals 53,000; 24,000 of those workers are based in Germany. The exact number of cuts will be determined after negotiations with workers’ groups, Reuters reports.
Ford’s $14 billion global cost-saving plans includes exiting the minivan segment, stopping manufacturing of automatic transmissions in Bordeaux in August, reconsidering its operations in Russia, and combining the headquarters of Ford U.K. and Ford Credit to a site in Dunton, Essex. Analysts have predicted Ford could shed up to 24,000 employees globally in the restructuring effort.
“This is not about making the business today more efficient but completely redesigning it,” Ford’s European president, Steve Armstrong, told the Financial Times. As Ford reconsiders its lineup, all new models sold in Europe will have electric or hybrid options as the carmaker tries to lower the CO2 output of its fleet before stringent EU targets come into effect next year.
