Bristol Myers Squibb Implements Layoffs in New Jersey Amid Cost-Cutting Measures
BMS has announced plans to lay off 195 employees across its two facilities in Lanceville, New Jersey as part of a broader cost-cutting initiative. In addition to the New Jersey layoffs, BMS had previously announced plans to reduce its global workforce by approximately 3,300 positions, representing about 5% of its total employees.
In addition to job cuts, CFO, David Elkins, also estimated two-thirds of the savings would come from cuts to R&D spending, resulting in a dozen clinical programs being ended. Despite these cuts, BMS continues to invest in strategic areas, such as the USD 14 bn acquisition of Karuna Therapeutics.
The following article originally appeared in Fierce Pharma.
Bristol Myers Squibb has executed another round of layoffs in its ongoing cost-savings push. The company has handed pink slips to 195 more employees, according to a New Jersey Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) update.
The dismissals will be effective between Feb. 13 and Dec. 31 of next year and will take place in Lawrenceville, New Jersey, where the drugmaker has two sites. BMS confirmed the layoffs but did not say where they will take place between its corporate headquarters on Route 206 and its Princeton Pike location, which houses BMS’ commercial and late-stage development teams.
The new wave of layoffs hike the count to 1,329 BMS employees in Lawrenceville who have been told this year that they will lose their jobs, according to the WARN rolls. In May alone, the company reduced its head count in Lawrenceville by 963. Those dismissals will be complete by Dec. 16.
The drugmaker confirmed that the reductions are part of a savings drive, which was revealed during its first-quarter earnings presentation in April and is designed to reduce costs by $1.5 billion by the end of 2025. When it announced the plan, BMS said it expected around 2,200 roles to be chopped in 2024, which would cut its staff by 6%.
“We are focused on strengthening the company’s long-term growth profile,” a BMS spokesperson wrote in an email. “We are optimizing operations across the company while prioritizing investments in innovative and transformational medicines where we can deliver the highest value for patients and shareholders.”
In April, Chief Financial Officer David Elkins said about two-thirds of the savings would come from R&D spending. Chief Medical Officer Samit Hirawat, M.D., added that BMS was ending work on about a dozen clinical programs.
In March, the company also said it was cutting 252 staffers from its San Diego-based subsidiary Mirati Therapeutics. BMS wasted little time executing the layoffs after it closed its $4.8 billion acquisition of the cancer specialist in January.
The reductions come as the company faces pressure from forthcoming patent expirations for Pfizer-partnered blood thinner Eliquis and PD-1 inhibitor Opdivo.
BMS is not the only large pharma company that has retooled its business this year.
Pfizer has embarked on a quest to save $4 billion by the end of this year. In May, the company unveiled another savings initiative that will take place over multiple years. Novartis, Bayer, Takeda and Biogen have also undergone savings campaigns that have involved layoffs.
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