Shire Will Hand Pink Slips to 600 Employees in Pennsylvania
March 5, 2015
By Mark Terry, BioSpace.com Breaking News Staff
Dublin, Ireland-based Shire Pharmaceuticals filed a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification Act (WARN) with the Pennsylvania Department of Labor and Industry yesterday indicating about 600 layoffs by April 1.
Shire’s U.S. headquarters recently moved to Lexington, Mass. from Wayne, Pa., which is the primary cause of the layoffs.
“The vast majority of those jobs are being relocated to Lexington,” said Shire spokeswoman Gwen Fisher in a statement. The company expects to maintain 250 to 300 employees in Wayne, which operates Shire’s supply chain group, part of its human resources functions, finance operations and a so-called “market access team.”
In January 2015, Shire signed a merger agreement with Bedminster, N.J.-based NPS Pharmaceuticals, Inc. for $5.2 billion. “The acquisition of NPS Pharma is a significant step in advancing Shire’s strategy to become a leading biotechnology company,” said Flemming Ornskov, chief executive officer of Shire in a statement. “With our global strength and expertise in both rare diseases and GI, Shire is uniquely positioned to drive the continued success of GATTEX/REVESTIVE, and, if approved, commercialize NPS Pharma’s pipeline compound NATPARA/NATPAR.”
On Feb. 24, 2015 the company announced it had acquired San Diego, Calif.-based Meritage Pharma, Inc. for an upfront $70 million with possible milestone payments. It has also been rumored that Shire might pick up South Plainfield, N.J.-based PTC Therapeutics Inc..
Some of this merger-and-acquisition activity has been the results of a spare $1.6 billion the company gained from the failed AbbVie deal. Chicago-based AbbVie originally planed to acquire Shire for $54 billion. In July 2014 the companies announced the merger, but changes in U.S. tax policy designed to discourage so-called “tax inversion” deals where domestic companies move their headquarters abroad scuttled the acquisition. The $1.6 billion was a termination fee.
“Chesterbrook, the greater Philadelphia area, and the talent of our employees based there have been instrumental to Shire’s growth and evolution,” said Ornskov in a statement when the change in headquarters was announced in November 2014. “We’ve made the decision to consolidate our U.S. operations in the Massachusetts area to streamline operations and drive further efficiencies in the way we run our business and serve patients. Shire has a great opportunity to combine our Chesterbrook and Lexington talent with the leading biotech resources in the Massachusetts area, and we consider ready access to these resources an important element in the future growth of our company.”
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Last week controversy erupted over the compensation package for Sanofi’s new CEO, Olivier Brandicourt, with several French government officials decrying the amount, calling it "incomprehensible." Brandicourt could walk off with as much as $4.5 million in a “golden handshake” payment in addition to making $4.76 million a year. That base figure is comprised by a fixed annual salary of $1.36 million a year, which is supplemented by a performance-related bonus of between 150 to 250 percent, as well as stock options and performance shares.
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