AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)02/10 Report--

In pursuit of scale and cost-effectiveness, more and more traditional automakers are starting layoffs, especially the rapid rise of electrification and smart driving, which makes automakers significantly reduce their investment in traditional areas. Earlier, the parent company of Mercedes-Benz decided to lay off about 10,000 yuan. According to the latest news from foreign media, Daimler will expand the scale of its cost-cutting program, and the final number of layoffs will be far more than 10,000.

Daimler plans to announce an expansion of its cost-cutting plan at its annual press conference on Tuesday and will announce a reduction in investment in loss-making projects in non-core businesses, including plans to cut up to 15000 jobs, the German business daily reported.

Daimler's layoffs and cost-cutting programs were officially launched as early as last year. In November 2019, Daimler announced that it would cut at least 10, 000 jobs worldwide and cut staff costs by about 1.4 billion euros by the end of 2022. Daimler said it had agreed with the unions on various cost-cutting and job-cutting measures, including expanding part-time retirement and severance plans in Germany. In addition, the company will cut 10 per cent of its global management positions and about 1100 management staff will be laid off.

While cutting investment costs in traditional areas, Daimler will be better positioned to shift to emerging areas such as self-driving and electric cars.

In fact, Daimler's expansion of layoffs is related to a serious decline in performance. Not long ago, Daimler issued its third profit warning in 2019, showing that profit before interest and tax in 2019 is expected to fall by 50% to 5.6 billion euros (42.9 billion yuan) from 11.1 billion euros a year earlier. Daimler said costs associated with the diesel scandal, heavy investment in electric vehicles and production problems weighed on its full-year earnings and halved profits.

Ola Kaellenius, Daimler's new chief executive, said that in this challenging environment, Mercedes-Benz would further improve its sales performance and invest more in new technology and profitable sales growth.

In addition, traditional automakers such as Audi, BMW and Nissan have also announced layoffs one after another.

In November, Audi officially announced that it would cut 9500 jobs, or about 10 per cent of its workforce, by 2025. This will save Audi 6 billion euros in costs over the next decade to support companies to accelerate the transition to electrification and digitization.

In March last year, BMW proposed a cost-cutting plan of 12 billion euros (93.9 billion yuan), cut bonuses for German employees and considered cutting 6000 jobs.

Nissan's performance has fallen sharply, and the company has announced global layoffs of 12500 jobs, or about 10 per cent of Nissan's global workforce, by 2022. The move is designed to reverse the decline of the business.

The president of the German Automobile Industry Association predicted that workers in the automobile industry are about to usher in a cold winter. He said that the layoffs in the German auto industry will be more significant in 2020, and this round of layoffs in the auto industry is caused by a combination of factors.

Welcome to subscribe to the WeChat public account "Automotive Industry Focus" to get the first-hand insider information on the automotive industry and talk about things in the automotive circle. Welcome to break the news! WeChat ID autoWechat