Evotec axes 400 jobs worldwide

In the first half of the year, the CRO achieved 7% less turnover than in the previous year. This is apparently due to lower demand from the pharmaceutical industry for screening and preclinical services – the contract research organisation Charles River had already announced cost-cutting measures at the beginning of August. Charles River announced cost-cutting measures as a result of lower demand.

For this reason, CEO Christian Wojczewski, who only took over as Evotec’s restructurer at the beginning of July, is accelerating the restructuring programme with the aim of exceeding the revised half-year forecast by up to €40m by the end of the year. The focus is on strengthening profitable areas and future markets and core expertises as well as exiting cost-intensive ones.

In addition to cutting 400 jobs worldwide, the company will, as already announced in April, close its gene therapy unit in Orth, Austria, which was created four years ago and employs 40 people. What this means for the existing co-operations with Takeda and the British SynaptixBio Ltd has not been publicly communicated. The design of viral AAV vectors for various therapeutic payloads, generating AAV material for research and non-clinical studies, in vitro and in vivo proof of concept studies for target validation, as well as conducting non-clinical gene therapy studies, which are too investment-intensive, will also be lost.

In addition, a chemical unit in Darcy near Lyon and a production unit in Halle, Germany, will be closed. The local presence is also to be reduced by cancelling lease agreements. In contrast, the US unit Just Evotec, which achieved growth of more than 50% in the first half of the year, will be strengthened.