THYSSENKRUPP TO CUT 5,000 MORE JOBS

Ailing conglomerate Thyssenkrupp said it would need to cut a further 5,000 jobs to ease the impact of the coronavirus crisis on its businesses.

The company, whose steelmaking roots go back more than 200 years, is struggling to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic that hit it during a cool down of the global economy, Christoph Steitz and Tom Käckenhoff reported for Reuters.

“We’re not yet where we need to be. The next steps could be more painful than the previous ones. But we will have to take them,” Chief Executive Martina Merz said in a statement. The latest job cuts come after 6,000 reductions announced last year, and brings the total number of planned layoffs to 11,000, a third of which has already been realized, Thyssenkrupp said.

The remaining 7,400 positions, or 7% of Thyssenkrupp’s current workforce, are to be cut over the next three years. Thyssenkrupp said it expects its adjusted operating loss to narrow to a mid-triple digit million-euro range in the fiscal year to September 2021, compared with a loss of 1.6 billion euros ($1.9 billion) in the previous fiscal year. The company’s shares, which have declined 59% this year, were indicated to open 6.2% lower in early trade, with traders pointing to the weak outlook.