Bradken has announced it will be shutting down its “highest
cost manufacturing facilities” and cutting its workforce.
It follows the manufacturer’s announcement of a “reorganisation
of its manufacturing” in an aim to reduce the company’s operating costs by $27
million annually.
“Bradken intends to progressively close a number of its
highest cost manufacturing facilities and reduce associated costs and by
transferring work,” it said in a company statement.
It went on to state “the reorganisation is expected to see
Bradken’s total employee numbers reduced to 4700, down 10% from December 2013
and 25% down from the peak in September 2012”.
In August last year it cut more than a 1000 jobs globally, from its workforce at the time 5425, cutting its Australian contingent by 14%.
Bradken last week announced it is closing its Henderson
foundry in Perth and relocating the work to its Runcorn foundry in Brisbane and
Xuzhou foundry in China.
As a result of these reorganisations there will be a large
one-off charge of approximately $51.4 million before tax, which related mainly
to retrenchment costs, plant and equipment write-offs, and site closure costs.
Bradken was contact for comment but was unavailable at the
time of publishing.
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