Restructuring events
European Restructuring Monitor (ERM)
The restructuring events database contains factsheets with data on large-scale restructuring events reported in the principal national media and company websites in each EU Member State. This database was created in 2002.
The trade union organisations of IBM France announced that the IT group was going to present an Employment safeguard plan on 16 December to cut between 1,180 and 1,385 jobs, that is almost a quarter of its workforce in France. This plan could lead to redundancies if there are not enough employees volunteering to leave the company.
The company is positioning its core business in cloud computing and will create a new company in 2021 to deal with the infrastructure management part of the business. In the framework of the new reorganisation, most departures are expected to take place through measures for workers in the older age bracket (the average age is 54) or support for a transfer to another company. The departure plan is part of a European restructuring plan with 10,000 job cuts (20% of the workforce in Europe) that was announced in November 2020.
Update 4 May 2021:After negotiations with the trade unions, the management finally opted for a voluntary redundancy plan that will affect between 1,000 and 1,250 employees. At the head office, in Bois-Colombes (Haut-de-Seine), where 2,500 of the company's 5,000 French employees work, the departures should concern 625 employees.
The workforce of the group, which had around 20,000 employees at the beginning of the 2000s, is expected to fall to 4,000 employees. IBM France has carried out several voluntary redundancy plans in recent years, but never with such a high level of job cuts. Four reorganisations were recorded in the past: 825 job cuts in 2005 ; 689 job cuts in 2013 ; 345 job cuts in 2015 and 99 job cuts in 2018 (and 490 recruitments).
Eurofound (2020), IBM, Internal restructuring in France, factsheet number 102692, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://dev.eurofound.europa.eu/restructuring-events/detail/102692.
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