NEW YORK (GenomeWeb News) – Thermo Fisher Scientific has reduced its headcount by about 890 through the first nine months of the year, including 450 during the third quarter, it disclosed in it quarterly earnings document filed today with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.
The firm said in its 10-Q that the brunt of the reductions have occurred in its Laboratory Products and Services segment, where the number of employees have been lowered by 570 through three quarters, and by 260 in the third quarter.
In Analytical Technologies, the headcount reduction totaled 270 through the first nine months of the year and 180 in the third quarter, while the newly formed Specialty Diagnostics segment saw headcount reductions of 50 through three quarters and 10 in the third quarter.
Thermo Fisher has about 37,000 employees worldwide.
The company had alluded to layoffs and other headcount efforts during its third-quarter earnings conference call last week, with company officials saying that cost-reduction initiatives had been implemented to counter a slowdown in its academic/government end market, which accounts for about 24 percent of total revenues.
In addition to efforts already started, President and CEO Marc Casper said on the conference call that Thermo Fisher continues to "drive additional actions" in the fourth quarter and has put in place "very targeted share gain action plans to maximize our performance" in the Laboratory Product and Services segment, which has been most impacted by the academic/government business slowdown.
The initiatives have achieved about $30 million in annualized benefits, and in its SEC filing today Thermo Fisher said that as of Nov. 4 it has "identified restructuring actions that will result in additional charges of approximately $40 million in 2011 and expects to identify additional actions during the remainder of 2011. The restructuring actions initiated in the first nine months of 2011 are expected to result in annual cost savings of approximately $60 million."