Bosch Portugal may not be immune from redundancies

German multinational Bosch, which recorded sales of more than €2,000 million euros in Portugal last year and employs more than 7,000 in the country, does not rule out that Portugal may be part of the redundancy plan announced by the company, which plans to eliminate 5,500 jobs, most of them in Germany. An official source from the company in Portugal says that “it is too early” to give more information.

“At the moment, what we can say is that it is still too early to provide more information, since negotiations are just beginning,” an official source from Bosch in Portugal told online news source ECO. The same source said that “other details are part of the discussions with employee representatives and, therefore, we cannot make any concrete statements at this stage”.

With more than 7,000 employees at the Braga, Aveiro, Ovar and Lisbon service hub, Bosch is one of the largest employers and exporters in the country. Bosch said this Friday in a statement that it expects to eliminate 5,550 jobs worldwide, mainly in Germany, due to difficulties in the new vehicles market – the job cuts will continue until 2030.

“World vehicle production will stagnate this year at around 93 million units, and may even decrease compared to the previous year,” the German group explained.

Until now, the unit in Portugal had ruled out the possibility of redundancies in the country. “Portugal will not be affected by the redundancies and we stand by what we said on the day when the results were presented in that growth is expected to be maintained, that is, the strategy is maintained”, guaranteed an official source of the company in written responses sent to ECO on November 15th.

It further added that, “despite a global economic and social environment that remains demanding, expectations for 2024 are for slight growth in all locations in Portugal.”