Vallourec will cut around 2,950 jobs worldwide out of 17,000, the group announced in a press release on Wednesday May 18. The closure of its German sites will lead to the deletion “about 2,400 positions”. To this will be added a reduction “about 550 positions” in so-called support functions.
In mid-November, the seamless tube manufacturing company, which was emerging from a long process of financial restructuring, announced the sale of its German activities and the cessation of the manufacture in Europe of tubes for industrial . It planned to transfer part of its activities to Brazil.
Vallourec specified on Wednesday that no “credible buyer has not been identified” for the German activities and therefore launches their closure. “The closure of German assets leads to further rationalization of other European assets in charge of finishing rolled tubes in Germany”, adds Vallourec. This will result in the closure of the “heat treatment line” of the French plant in Saint-Saulve (Nord).
Departures from the end of 2022
Of the 550 jobs cut in the rest of the world, “you have 70 in Scotland, by stopping the filleting activity, the volumes of which would be repatriated to the Aulnoye-Aymeries site (North), and 320 in France, including 65 at the head office” of Meudon (Hauts-de-Seine), detailed the CEO of the group, Philippe Guillemot, during a conference call.
Some 250 jobs will be cut in the north of France, which are divided between just under a hundred on the Saint-Saulve site, around a hundred jobs on the Aulnoye-Aymeries site “and the balance on the shared services center that we have in Valenciennes”said Mr. Guillemot.
Regarding the schedule, “we are in discussions that take the time they must take in the countries in which we operate”, replied the CEO. He envisages departures from the end of 2022 and which will be spread out “over the whole of 2023, in particular in Germany”since this country will continue to produce as long as the volumes that are made in Germany are not transferred to Brazil.