British luxury car manufacturer Bentley Motors recently announced that it is planning to lay off a quarter of its workforce, or about 1,000 jobs due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the automobile industry.
With the recent announcement, Bentley is the latest premium British firm to make significant job cuts following the coronavirus crisis. Its rivals Mclaren and Aston Martin have also announced major layoffs.
A century-old brand, which has a 4,200 strong workforce, said it will offer voluntary redundancy terms to employees. However the company did not rule out the possibility of compulsory redundancies.
Company Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Adrian Hallmark said, “This is a necessary step that we have to take to safeguard the jobs of the vast majority who will remain, and deliver a sustainable business model for the future. COVID-19 has not been the cause of this measure but a hastener.”
Most number of Bently’s cars are produced at its Crewe factory in North-west England, however the plant had been shut down during the lockdowns. The site reopened on May 11, after seven weeks of suspending operations. With the opening of the plant, Bentley became one of the first automakers to resume production in Britain.
The firm faces hundreds of millions of pounds of deferred or lost revenue from the plant closure and reduced output due to the pandemic. The job losses form part of Bentley’s “Beyond100” strategy that will see it accelerate the development of electrified models.
It is targeting every model it offers to have the option of a hybrid variant by 2023, and its first pure electric model to be launched in 2026.
British new car sales tumbled by an annual 89% in May, only slightly less negative than April’s record 97% collapse, as car dealerships remained shuttered by the lockdown, industry data showed.
