Dive Brief:
- Daiichi is planning to lay off between 1,000 and 1,200 workers of its U.S. workers.
- The job cuts will be implemented over a period of months and will primarily affect workers in its commercial operations.
- This is the company's second major layoff in the last 18 months.
Dive Insight:
When Daiichi laid off 16% of its commercial U.S. workforce this past spring, it was a painful process. At that point, Daiichi not only laid off workers, but also sold its stake in Ranbaxy Labs to Sun Pharma.
Those moves were supposed to stabilize the company and prepare it for a period of profitability and minimal drama. Unfortunately, Daiichi's focus on primary care medications has not paid off lately. Sales were down signficantly last year to $2.6 billion, and Benicar, its top-seling hypertension medication, is slated to go off patent in 2016.
The result: A new round of job cuts, including sale reps and workers at the company's Parsippany headquarters. The company reports that R&D will not be affected by the job cuts and that it will start to refocus its efforts away from primary care towards speciality drugs.