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II. Restructuring of
European operations
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The following are more detailed descriptions of
the measures currently being implemented or under consideration;
Regarding our bearings operation, production of
water-pump bearings at the Peterlee Plant shall be partially
stopped and transferred to Japan. As for the former RHP
plants, production of ball and cylindrical roller bearings
shall be stopped and changed to imports from Japan. Small-sized
ball bearings currently being produced at the Iskra Plant
in Poland shall be transferred to the Jakarta Plant.
Regarding automotive components, we currently have
3 steering column production sites in the U.K., but will
integrate 2 plants in the Peterlee area during 2002, and
reduce costs by drastically streamlining the administrative
divisions, centering on the Silverstone site, in an attempt
to return to profit by the end of 2002. The EPS production
plant in Poland, which is under construction, shall be
postponed for the time being due to the deterioration
of the economic environment and design changes of our
customer. As for the administrative divisions,
our pan-European market-oriented marketing and sales organization
is operating very well, and we will now aim for a leaner
organization. Our logistics division is currently engaged
in the "European Central Delivery Center Project",
while our finance divisions are gradually preparing to
transfer functions to a shared-service organization. Also,
in accordance with the reorganization of our production
divisions, we are planning to scale-down our European
Technology Center. In line with these measures,
we will close our European headquarters, currently located
just outside Nottingham, U.K., by the end of 2002, transfer
the European Technology Center by mid-2003, and cease
our Nottingham operations. As part of the reorganization
of our production and administrative divisions, we are
planning to reduce our European workforce by 1,500 workers
by the end of 2002, the majority of which will take place
in the U.K. This figure includes the 400 workers that
will be dismissed at the Iskra Plant at the end of January
next year. We estimate the benefit of these
measures to amount to 7 billion yen. |
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