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.
French steel pipes maker Vallourec has announced plans to cut 2,000 jobs across its global workforce over the next two years. Three quarter of these job reductions will be located in Europe. Overall, the announced job cuts represent almost 10 per cent of the company’s global workforce.
The planned job cuts are in addition to the 1,400 job losses that the company had already announced in February 2015. As part of its cost saving measures, it is planned that the company’s European tube and steel production units will be downsized by a third.
The restructuring measures are part of the company’s wider efforts to restore competitiveness and reduce operating costs. The company recorded a sharp decline in its profit margins in the first quarter of 2015, caused by a severe fall in activity amongst its customers in the oil and gas market following a fall in the oil prices of nearly 50 per cent. It is foreseen that the implementation of the job cuts will enable the company to achieve savings of €350 million euros per year in its operating costs from 2017 onwards.
The company announced that employee representatives had been informed of the decision, and that consultations would be initiated to minimise the social impact of the proposed job reductions and facilitate the return to work of the affected employees.
Eurofound (2015), Vallourec, Internal restructuring in World, factsheet number 79463, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://dev.eurofound.europa.eu/restructuring-events/detail/79463.
This working paper offers a comprehensive methodological overview of the European Restructuring Monitor (ERM) databases. Even though the methodology has not changed over time, new categories have been added, and the way it has been used by researchers and policymakers...
This Eurofound research paper explores key trends in restructuring in recent years, highlighting the companies that announced the largest job losses and job gains in the EU. It builds on an analysis of company announcements recorded in Eurofound’s European Restructuring...
In 2023, thousands of workers in big tech lost their jobs. Meta, Amazon, Google, Apple, Microsoft and Salesforce had been considered to offer good and secure jobs up to this point. Giants of the information and communication technology (ICT) sector,...
In 2024, the automotive sector in the EU came to the fore in public and policy discussions. The focus was on the slowdown in electric vehicle (EV) sales, rising global competition, belated investments in new technologies, and the potential closure...
The more employee monitoring resembles surveillance – with its systematic, continuous and detailed tracking of employees' activities, behaviours or communications – the greater the potential for infringement of both privacy and data protection rights. Although the EU General Data Protection...
Since 2013, Eurofound's ERM database on restructuring-related legislation has been documenting regulatory developments in the Member States of the European Union and Norway which are explicitly or implicitly linked to anticipating and managing change. The most recent update to the...
