The restructuring events database contains factsheets with data on large-scale restructuring events reported in the principal national media and company websites in each EU Member State. This database was created in 2002.
Manufacturing Manufacturing Of Furniture And Other Manufacturing Other Manufacturing 32.4 - Manufacture of games and toys
310 jobs Number of planned job losses
Announcement Date
11 January 2007
Employment effect (start)
Foreseen end date
Description
Model railway set manufacturer Märklin announced its plans to streamline its manufacturing process in order to save costs.
The company is planning to cut 310 jobs and close two out of four manufacturing plants in Germany. The site in Sonneberg, Thuringia (220 employees, not all to be dismissed) shall be closed; the unit in Nuremberg, Bavaria, where 60 workers will be dismissed, is going to focus on development only. At the company's headquarter in Göppingen, 60 manufacturing and administrative jobs will be cut. Manufacturing, which will be partially outsourced, will be concentrated in Göppingen, Bavaria, and at Märklin's plant in Györ, Hungary.
Family-owned German model railway set manufacturer Märklin faced bankruptcy when in 2006 a manager of US-based restructuring specialist Alix Partner was appointed to manage the restructuring process. The firm was sold to British equity firm Kingsbridge Capital. The Märklin case is said to be a testcase of how the business model of anglo-saxon equity firms relates to German family-owned firms ('Mittelstand').
Sources
11 January 2007: Financial Times Deutschland
11 January 2007: Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung
11 January 2007: Handelsblatt
Citation
Eurofound (2007), Märklin, Internal restructuring in Germany, factsheet number 64758, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/64758.
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
The retail banking sector is fertile ground for studying the impacts of digitalisation on work and employment. Financial services are increasingly provided online, without the intermediary of customer-facing institutions.
European labour markets have recovered strongly from COVID-19. By the end of 2021, little more than 18 months after the start of the pandemic, employment rates in the EU were almost at pre-crisis levels.
