FLS Aerospace aims to trim Dublin workforce

FLS Aerospace, the Danish group which acquired the TEAM Aer Lingus plant at Dublin Airport in 1998, wants to reduce its workforce there by 60 as soon as possible, The Irish Times has learned.

Around 1,800 people work for the company in Dublin.

Workers and trade unions at the aircraft maintenance company have been notified that there will be no compulsory redundancies at the plant, a spokeswoman says.

The group will try to secure the job losses by accelerating an existing early-retirement package to offer workers the option of leaving "at the earliest opportunity". Further scaling back would be secured by "natural attrition" and "redeployment".

The changes, to be finalised next week, are part of a rationalisation plan being introduced by the company's new chief executive, Mr Stephen Henderson.

Mr Henderson, a Briton, was appointed two months ago to replace Mr Steffen Harpoth who resigned last February after a "disappointing financial result" in 1999.

But while the company reported losses of more than €25 million (£19.7 million) last year, its Irish operations are believed to be performing well.

Mr Henderson is implementing a "huge process of restructuring" aimed at returning the group to profitability in the last quarter of this year. "We hope to report profits for 2001," said the spokeswoman.

The Aerospace firm's parent company, FLS Industries, said in a statement last May, however, that "the prospects of a substantially improved financial result [at group level] will not be fulfilled". FLS's aerospace operations are considered crucial to the group's future strategy, which is under review at the moment.

Industry sources said FLS Aerospace was seeking an additional 160 job cuts at its British operations in Manchester and Stansted Airport outside London. The Dublin cuts would be implemented in "management and support areas", sources said.

Insisting that the prospects for the Dublin operation were good, a spokeswoman said consulting firms KPMG and PA were developing a change programme at the Dublin plant.

FLS Aerospace acquired TEAM for an undisclosed sum, although speculation at the time of the deal suggested the Danish group paid about £25 million for the company.

Mr Harpoth was a key figure in the acquisition, although he admitted at the time of his departure that he had taken his "eye off the ball" regarding the company's activities in Britain and Demark.

Many observers believe Mr Henderson was hired to rescue the troubled company. Just one month after his arrival, FLS Industries revealed that its chief financial officer, Mr Jens Due Olsen, had resigned "after some consideration".

Mr Olsen is expected to leave the group next month once the strategy review and a revision and tightening of the group's reporting and control systems was finalised.

Earlier, the chief executive of an FLS sister company, which supplies cleaning materials for flue gas systems, resigned due the "unsatisfactory development" of its earnings.