Suntech workers to choose reassignment or layoff
Staff Reporter 2012-09-18 16:49
A solar park in Xinjiagn Uygur Autonomous Region of China. The country's solar industry is facing setbacks caused by stocks and trade investigations launched by other countries. (File photo/Xhinua)
Suntech, the world's largest producer of solar panels, has announced the closure of battery production lines in Wuxi in eastern China's Jiangsu province. The move is considered an indirect method of downsizing during the current trend of layoffs in the country's gloomy solar industry.
The company said that the deteriorating global solar energy business will push the company to continue optimizing its operations, especially considering the effect of US and European antidumping and countervailing duties for Chinese companies.
The company's CEO, Jin Wei, said that 1,500 workers will be affected. Some of the company's workers reportedly did not reach a consensus on negotiations of severance pay.
The company recently accepted a new order which was supposed to be handled by its P2 factory but was assigned, along with its workers, to its P3 factory. Workers of the former factory were unwilling to take the assignment and were worried about being laid off after the move because the same situation had happened before, Shanghai's First Financial Daily quoted sources familiar with the matter as saying.
The company had once transferred around 100 workers for a new order but the company laid off them for unrelated reasons before finishing the products. Most of workers have worried that this is how the company's layoff plans will be carried out.
The P2 factory has around 1,000 workers handling solar battery products. The P3 and P4 factories are the company's automatic production lines responsible for solar components and batteries.
The company responded by saying that affected employees can choose to be transferred to other production lines or choose a compensation package.
In July, the company was involved in an investigation of counter guarantee and analysts considered that the only way to solve the problem was to declare bankruptcy and undergo reorganization. The total debt of the company stood at US$3.58 billion with total assets of US$4.38 billion as of the first quarter.
