Pfizer Plans 16,300 Layoffs Amid Health Benefit Cuts for Retirees
Posted Aug 16 2011 6:51pm
Pfizer (PFE) plans to lay off 16,300 more employees as it grapples with declining sales of Lipitor, its best-selling cholesterol product, and attempts to meet savings targets promised to Wall Street. Lipitor sales reps will begin to receive phone calls about their fate this week, according to Pharmalot.
Pfizer is also in the process of a massive transfer of wealth from its 23,000 retirees — and those about to retire in the next few years — to itself. That has saved Pfizer $534 million in healthcare expenditures and reduced liabilities since 2009.
In its quarterly 10-Q disclosure to the SEC (page 10), Pfizer said that a “cost-reduction and transformation” plan put in place in 2005 has targeted 55,400 jobs, of which 39,100 have been terminated. That means 16,300 are yet to come. The company has spent $856 million on “employee termination costs” this year, up from $576 million through the first half of last year, and $1.9 billion in total costs associated with the company’s cost reduction initiatives.
Pfizer (PFE) plans to lay off 16,300 more employees as it grapples with declining sales of Lipitor, its best-selling cholesterol product, and attempts to meet savings targets promised to Wall Street. Lipitor sales reps will begin to receive phone calls about their fate this week, according to Pharmalot.
Pfizer is also in the process of a massive transfer of wealth from its 23,000 retirees — and those about to retire in the next few years — to itself. That has saved Pfizer $534 million in healthcare expenditures and reduced liabilities since 2009.
In its quarterly 10-Q disclosure to the SEC (page 10), Pfizer said that a “cost-reduction and transformation” plan put in place in 2005 has targeted 55,400 jobs, of which 39,100 have been terminated. That means 16,300 are yet to come. The company has spent $856 million on “employee termination costs” this year, up from $576 million through the first half of last year, and $1.9 billion in total costs associated with the company’s cost reduction initiatives.