The layoffs come days after US President Donald Trump threatened 50 p.c tariffs on EU items.
Swedish automaker Volvo is ready to chop 3,000 white-collar jobs amid restructuring efforts as costs start to rise on account of tariff-driven uncertainty.
The corporate introduced the information on Monday. The layoffs come because the Swedish automaker tries to resurrect its rock-bottom share value and drum up higher demand for its vehicles by restructuring a part of its enterprise and chopping prices.
CEO Hakan Samuelsson, who was not too long ago introduced again to the position after heading the corporate for a decade till 2022, unveiled a programme in April to slash prices by $1.9bn (18 billion Swedish crowns), together with a considerable lower to Volvo’s white-collar employees, who make up 40 p.c of its workforce.
“It’s white collar in nearly all areas, together with R&D [research and development], communication, human sources,” Samuelsson advised the Reuters information company.
The layoffs symbolize round 15 p.c of the corporate’s workplace employees, Volvo Vehicles mentioned in a press release, and would incur a one-time restructuring value of $160m (1.5 billion crowns).
Volvo Vehicles’ new CFO Fredrik Hansson advised Reuters that whereas all of its departments and areas can be impacted, a lot of the redundancies will occur in Gothenburg.
“It’s tailor-made to make us structurally extra environment friendly, after which how that performs out may differ a bit relying on the world. However no stone is left unturned,” Hansson mentioned.
With most of its manufacturing based mostly in Europe and China, Volvo Vehicles is extra uncovered to new United States tariffs than lots of its European rivals, and has mentioned it might change into unimaginable to export its most reasonably priced vehicles to the US.
The corporate mentioned in a press launch that it will finalise a brand new structural setup by the third quarter of this yr.
Volvo withdrew its monetary steering because it introduced its value cuts final month, pointing to unpredictable markets amid weaker shopper confidence and commerce tariffs inflicting turmoil within the world auto business.
The layoff announcement comes solely days after US President Donald Trump threatened to impose a 50 p.c tariff on imports from the European Union from June 1. On Monday, nevertheless, he backed away from that date, restoring a July 9 deadline to permit for talks between Washington and Brussels.
Consequently, Volvo’s CEO mentioned the transfer would make it more durable for it to promote certainly one of its electrical automobiles (EVs) — the EX30 EV that’s made in Belgium — within the US market.
