Staff from the National Archeology Office hang photos of items found on a construction trailer during a major archaeological survey of the Northvolt site.
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Battery maker Northvolt announced on Monday it plans to cut a total of 1,600 jobs in Sweden as part of a major cost-cutting drive.
In an update posted on its website, Northvolt said that following initial steps taken as part of a strategic review, the company has revised the scope of its operations in Sweden “to ensure that its resources are focused on accelerating production for large-scale battery manufacturing” .
The strategic move requires Northvolt to reduce its global headcount by about 20% and in Sweden by 25%, the company said.
The measures are expected to result in the redundancy of around 1,600 employees, including 1,000 positions at the Skellefteå plant in the north of the country, the company added. The company said all layoffs will be subject to ongoing union negotiations.
Northvolt currently produces batteries from its first Northvolt Ett gigafactory in Skellefteå, which the company said in March had more than 6,000 employees.
The company warned on September 9 that it would need to “make some difficult decisions about the size of our workforce to meet the need to reduce the scale of our operations.” At the time, Northvolt declined to say how many jobs might be affected.
In addition to the job cuts, the cash-strapped company said it would pause Northvolt Ett’s massive expansion plans, noting that the project was intended to provide an additional 30 gigawatt hours of annual battery manufacturing capacity.
The measures announced are part of a wider strategic review and a response to what Northwalter described as a “challenging macroeconomic environment”.
Headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden, Northvolt is one of Europe’s most valuable private technology companies and produces lithium-ion batteries for the electric vehicle industry. It has partnerships with a number of major European carmakers, including Volkswagen and Volvo.
Northvolt CEO and co-founder Peter Carlsson said in a statement that the company needs to focus all its energy and investment on its core business.
“While overall momentum for electrification remains strong, we need to ensure the right actions are taken at the right time to address headwinds in the automotive market and the broader industrial environment,” Carlson said.
“Northvolt Ett’s recent production record shows that we are on the right path, but the decisions we make today, however difficult, are necessary for Northvolt’s future,” he added.
—CNBC’s Ryan Browne contributed to this report.
