Dive Brief:
- AstraZeneca will close its Ft. Washington, PA-based diabetes offices, and relocate 134 jobs to its Wilmington, DE plant. The move was disclosed in a WARN notice filed with Pennsylvania state Department of Labor & Industry.
- The British drugmaker says it is making these moves to create efficiencies and reduce expenses.
- The moves will be made as of October 3, 2016.
Dive Insight:
By moving the Ft. Washington operations to Wilmington, the area near the location of its North American headquarters in Fairfax, DE, AstraZeneca expects to "provide greater opportunity for closer collaboration and alignment within the U.S. business," company spokeswoman Michele Meixell said in an emailed statement. The jobs being relocated include marketing, medical affairs and sales in the diabetes business.
"We recognize change is difficult and are fully committed to working with employees to ensure they have the flexibility they need through this transition," she said.
While diabetes operations are moving to Wilmington, the company itself isn’t sure whether it will maintain its headquarters where it is currently located.
In May, AstraZeneca announced it would evaluate whether it would keep its North America headquarters at its current location near Wilmington, or move somewhere else – but nearby. "AstraZeneca remains committed to keeping its North America commercial headquarters in Delaware," Meixell added.
The company is still exploring options but will be putting the site on the market to sell, Meixell suggested. She wouldn’t comment on reasons for the moves but there has been speculation it has been related to the sale of its antibiotics business to Pfizer in August. The company had close to 2,100 people in the area and many of the plants in Delaware were heavily involved in the manufacturing for the antibiotics division.
As part of that planning, AstraZeneca will begin soliciting bids from real estate developers in the coming months, "and that will require putting our site, including the (company’s) child development center, on the market for sale," Meixell added.
"While no decisions have been made at this point, we continue to assess all options, one of which is the redevelopment of our current site," she said. "We hope to have more information to share by year end once the evaluations have further progressed."