Bracco

355 jobs
Number of planned job losses

Announcement Date

29 May 2006

Employment effect (start)

1 July 2006

Foreseen end date

1 July 2008

Description

Bracco is an Italy-based pharmaceutical multinational company and world leader in the production of contrast agents for medical diagnostics, which has invested in the last decades to provide integrated solutions for diagnostic imaging. The Bracco group is present in Europe, North America and Asia and has three research centres, respectively in Milan, Geneva and Princeton, New Jersey. The Bracco group has its head office, one research centre and a plant located in the industrial zone of Lambrate in Milan. In Italy, the Bracco group has also an innovative plant located at Torviscosa, in the Friuli region, and its largest industrial site, that is the Bracco Imaging plant, located at Ceriano Laghetto, near Milan (this plant takes up 300,000 square meters and employs around 400 workers). Altogether, in Italy, Bracco group employs around 950 workers.

On 29 May 2006, the company announced a reorganisation plan that provides the closure of one plant and the research centre on contrast agents, both placed in the industrial zone of Lambrate in Milan. The plant produces pharmaceutical products for distribution on the Italian market and employs 245 workers, while the research centre employs 110 workers. Moreover, the restructuring plan envisages the reorganisation of the production cycle at the Ceriano Laghetto’s Bracco Imaging, new investments in research and development (especially, in the sector of contrast agents for diagnostic imaging), and in the Torviscosa’s plant.

The company declared that this decision would contribute to develop its core business (contrast agents and therapeutic products) in a more effective way. The Bracco group aims to strengthen its direct presence in the international markets, in order to present itself as a consistent, high-technology group in the advanced medical diagnostics field.

The company and the trade unions reached an agreement on the reorganisation plan that will enable the workers involved to benefit of the “special” Wages Guarantee Fund (cassa integrazione guadagni straordinaria, CIGS), a “social shock absorber” that intervenes in cases of restructuring, reorganisation, change of activity or economic difficulties. The Wages Guarantee Fund scheme will start from July 2006, covering the two-year period 2006-2008. At the end of the first year of the CIGS’s scheme, 34% of the 245 workers employed in the Milan’s plant and 30% of the 110 workers employed in the research centre will be dismissed. In order to reduce the negative social impact of lay-offs, the agreement provides recourse to others “social shock absorbers” for redundant workers, such as “mobility” with a view to early retirement, economic incentives for voluntary resignation or retirement for those who are already eligible. Moreover, the agreement provides the redeployment or outplacement of some of workers involved in the reorganisation plan, who will have the opportunity to move to other units belonging to the Bracco group or to different companies.

Sources

• 29 May 2006: Il Diario del lavoro
• 30 May 2006: Il Sole 24 Ore