Novartis has today announced that Swiss firm SGS will buy and operate the assets of its International Service Laboratory on the Ringaskiddy campus, saving jobs at the Cork facility.
Under the terms of the deal, the 100 Novartis staff currently working at the Laboratories will transfer to SGS.
In October 2019, Novartis said it planned to cut over 300 jobs in Ringaskiddy as it had decided to close one of its production buildings by the middle of 2022.
Novartis said it has collaborated with SGS as an external supplier for a number of years and looked forward to a closer relationship.
Maeve Byrne, Managing Director at Novartis Ringaskiddy Limited, said the International Service Laboratory (ISL) has a strong reputation of quality expertise over the last 22 years
She said the company was excited to secure the continued development of ISL as an analytical centre of excellence as well as to support the sustainability of jobs and expertise.
“Novartis is happy to host SGS on the Ringaskiddy campus and to continue the collaboration,” she added.
Novartis is one of the world’s top ten pharmaceutical manufacturers and, like many others in the top ten, it has a presence at Ringaskiddy.
Novartis Ireland currently employs over 1,400 people across three locations in Cork and Dublin, while it has a global workforce of about 110,000 people.
SGS currently employs 300 people in Ireland and has more than 89,000 employees in over 2,600 offices and laboratories worldwide.
Today’s deal is expected to close at the end of the first quarter of 2021 subject to approval from the relevant regulatory authorities.
Article originally published on https://www.rte.ie/
