Lipitor fallout prompts Pfizer to cut Irish workforce
pharmafile | June 7, 2012 | News story | Manufacturing and Production | Amgen, Ireland, Lipitor, Pfizer, cuts, patent loss
Falling demand for blockbuster cholesterol drug Lipitor has prompted Pfizer to cut staff levels at two manufacturing facilities in Ireland.
Generic competition has been eating into Lipitor (atorvastatin) sales, and so Pfizer has elected to downsize its workforce at plants in Little Island and Ringaskiddy – both in Cork – with the loss of 177 positions.
Ringaskiddy will bear the brunt of the cuts, with 129 jobs set to go in 2013, with the remaining 48 going in Little Island. A voluntary redundancy scheme is already in place, but will be followed with compulsory redundancies if the staff reductions cannot be achieved, according to Pfizer Ireland.
In a statement, Pfizer Ireland vice president Dr Paul Duffy said: “Patent expiry means greater competition which impacts global demand, and we need to readjust the scale of our manufacturing operations.”
The Services Industrial Professional and Technical Union (SIPTU), which represents more than 350 of the workers at Ringaskiddy and Little Island, met with Pfizer bosses yesterday to discuss the threatened job losses.
“SIPTU received confirmation from the management of Pfizer that in line with an existing agreement any proposed job losses will not occur during 2012,” said the union’s chemical and medical devices sector organiser Alan O’Leary.
“This provides us with a period of time to engage with Pfizer to explore all avenues to reduce the actual number of job losses,” he added.
Pfizer’s decision comes against a backdrop of investment in Ireland, including a $200m round of investment at its biologics facility in Grange Castle announced last September and the establishment of a €190m biologics facility at Shanbally, adjacent to the Ringaskiddy site.
The firm did exit a site at Dun Laoghaire, Dublin, in 2011, but sold it on to Amgen which announced a $200m expansion programme in April.
“Ireland remains a key strategic location for Pfizer,” insisted Duffy, adding that the company employs around 4,000 people in Ireland across “diverse operations in pharmaceutical active ingredient manufacturing, tableting, biopharmaceutical manufacturing as well as treasury, shared services and commercial operations”.
Phil Taylor
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