London (CNN Business) Bayer plans to slash thousands of jobs as part of a corporate overhaul following its acquisition of Monsanto.

The chemicals and pharmaceuticals group said it would cut 12,000 jobs out of its global workforce of 118,000 by the end of 2021. A significant number of the reductions will be made in its home market of Germany.

More than 4,000 jobs will go at the company's crop sciences division, a consequence of Bayer's acquisition of US rival Monsanto earlier this year.

The German company said in a statement on Thursday that it was considering whether to sell more assets, including the sunscreen business Coppertone and footwear brand Dr. Scholl's.

Read More</s>BERLIN (AP) - German pharmaceutical giant Bayer AG says it's cutting 12,000 jobs worldwide as it seeks to reduce costs.

The Leverkusen-based company said Thursday that details of the cuts to its 118,200-stong workforce would be worked out in coming months but that "a significant number" of the reductions would come in Germany.

Bayer acquired U.S. seed and weed-killer maker Monsanto Co. this year. It says with the "synergies expected from the acquisition of Monsanto" and other efficiency and structural measures, including the job cuts, "Bayer anticipates annual contributions of 2.6 billion euros from 2022 on."

The company says a portion of the funds will be used to strengthen competitiveness and innovation in its divisions.

Bayer shares rose on the news and were up 3 percent in afternoon trading in Frankfurt.

FILE - In this May 25, 2018 file photo members of the supervisory board sit in front of the company logo during the annual shareholders meeting of German chemical giant Bayer AG in Bonn, Germany. Bayer said Thursday, Nov 29, 2018 it will cut 12 000 jobs, most of them in Germany. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, file)

FILE - In this April 28, 2010 file photo a vessel passes by the plant of chemical giant Bayer AG at the rive Rhine in Leverkusen, western Germany. Bayer said Thursday, Nov 29, 2018 it will cut 12 000 jobs, most of them in Germany. (AP Photo/Frank Austin, file)

FILE - In this Feb. 28, 2018 fiel photo CEO Werner Baumann of Bayer AG talks to the media at the Financial News Conference in Leverkusen, Germany. Bayer said Thursday, Nov 29, 2018 it will cut 12 000 jobs, most of them in Germany. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, file)</s>German pharmaceutical giant Bayer AG says it's cutting 12,000 jobs worldwide as it seeks to reduce costs. The company said "a significant number" of the reductions would come in Germany.

BERLIN (AP) — German pharmaceutical giant Bayer AG says it’s cutting 12,000 jobs worldwide as it seeks to reduce costs.

The Leverkusen-based company said Thursday that details of the cuts to its 118,200-stong workforce would be worked out in coming months but that “a significant number” of the reductions would come in Germany.

Bayer acquired U.S. seed and weed-killer maker Monsanto Co. this year. It says with the “synergies expected from the acquisition of Monsanto” and other efficiency and structural measures, including the job cuts, “Bayer anticipates annual contributions of 2.6 billion euros from 2022 on.”

The company says a portion of the funds will be used to strengthen competitiveness and innovation in its divisions.

Bayer shares rose on the news and were up 3 percent in afternoon trading in Frankfurt.

Copyright © 2018 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, written or redistributed.</s>The Leverkusen-based company said Thursday that details of the cuts to its 118,200-stong workforce would be worked out in coming months but that "a significant number" of the reductions would come in Germany.

Bayer acquired U.S. seed and weed-killer maker Monsanto Co. this year. It says with the "synergies expected from the acquisition of Monsanto" and other efficiency and structural measures, including the job cuts, "Bayer anticipates annual contributions of 2.6 billion euros from 2022 on."

The company says a portion of the funds will be used to strengthen competitiveness and innovation in its divisions.

Bayer shares rose on the news and were up 3 percent in afternoon trading in Frankfurt.

In this April 28, 2010 file photo a vessel passes by the plant of chemical giant Bayer AG at the rive Rhine in Leverkusen, western Germany. Bayer said Thursday, Nov 29, 2018 it will cut 12 000 jobs, most of them in Germany. (AP Photo/Frank Austin, file) In this Feb. 28, 2018 fiel photo CEO Werner Baumann of Bayer AG talks to the media at the Financial News Conference in Leverkusen, Germany. Bayer said Thursday, Nov 29, 2018 it will cut 12 000 jobs, most of them in Germany. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, file)</s>German pharmaceutical giant Bayer AG says it's cutting 12,000 jobs worldwide as it seeks to reduce costs.

The Leverkusen-based company said Thursday that details of the cuts to its 118,200-stong workforce would be worked out in coming months but that "a significant number" of the reductions would come in Germany.

Bayer acquired U.S. seed and weed-killer maker Monsanto Co. this year. It says with the "synergies expected from the acquisition of Monsanto" and other efficiency and structural measures, including the job cuts, "Bayer anticipates annual contributions of 2.6 billion euros from 2022 on."

The company says a portion of the funds will be used to strengthen competitiveness and innovation in its divisions.

Bayer shares rose on the news and were up 3 percent in afternoon trading in Frankfurt.</s>Bayer plans to slash thousands of jobs as part of a corporate overhaul following its acquisition of Monsanto.

The chemicals and pharmaceuticals group said it would cut 12,000 jobs out of its global workforce of 118,000 by the end of 2021. A significant number of the reductions will be made in its home market of Germany.

More than 4,000 jobs will go at the company’s crop sciences division, a consequence of Bayer’s acquisition of US rival Monsanto earlier this year.

Bayer (BAYRY) spent over $60 billion buying Monsanto. To gain regulatory approval for the deal, Bayer agreed to sell assets including its seed business and some herbicide brands.

The German company said in a statement on Thursday that it was considering whether to sell more assets, including the sunscreen business Coppertone and footwear brand Dr. Scholl’s.

It will get out of the business of animal health, and sell its 60% stake in Currenta, a company that provides services to chemical companies.

Shares in Bayer have dropped by more than a third so far this year, in part because of concerns over the company’s exposure to lawsuits involving Roundup, a weedkiller made by Monsanto.

In August, San Francisco jurors awarded $289 million in damages to a former school groundskeeper who said his terminal cancer had been caused by the product.

The damages were later reduced by a judge, but hundreds of other patients have made similar claims. Monsanto has said the product is safe when used as directed.</s>FILE - In this May 25, 2018 file photo members of the supervisory board sit in front of the company logo during the annual shareholders meeting of German chemical giant Bayer AG in Bonn, Germany. Bayer said Thursday, Nov 29, 2018 it will cut 12 000 jobs, most of them in Germany. (AP Photo/Martin Meissner, file) (Martin Meissner)</s>BERLIN— Bayer AG BAYRY -1.28% on Thursday said it would cut 12,000 jobs and sell its animal-health business, Coppertone sunscreens and Dr. Scholl’s foot-care products in an effort to win back investors’ trust after a string of setbacks and a sharp fall in its share price.

The job cuts, targeting some 10% of Bayer’s 118,200 global workforce, come as the German chemicals and pharmaceuticals company faces challenges in most of its businesses, from falling sales of over-the-counter drugs to a dwindling stable of blockbuster prescription medicines.

Compounding its difficulties, the company known mainly as the inventor of Aspirin faces nearly 10,000 lawsuits from users of weedkillers it recently acquired as part of Monsanto. Plaintiffs allege the products cause cancer, a claim Bayer has vigorously rejected.

The $63 billion Monsanto acquisition, which closed in June, was a bid by Chief Executive Werner Baumann to boost the company’s scale and give it a strong second leg in crops and seeds alongside its pharmaceutical activities.

But the legal woes have put the company on the defensive and angered some investors already skeptical of the deal when it was clinched. With the stock falling, some Bayer leaders are also growing anxious that the company could become a target for hostile investors, according to a person familiar with the company.

Bayer’s shares have lost roughly a third of their value since a San Francisco jury verdict in August found that Monsanto’s Roundup weedkillers, which contain the chemical glyphosate, were responsible for causing cancer in a man. Bayer is appealing the decision.

Thursday’s announcement wasn’t linked to the glyphosate litigation or the Monsanto acquisition, Mr. Baumann told reporters, adding that the job cuts and disposals would “position Bayer as a leader across all its businesses.”

“These changes are necessary and lay the foundation for Bayer to enhance its performance and agility,” Mr. Baumann said.

Bayer said it expected the battery of cost-saving measures and disposals to create annual savings of €2.6 billion ($2.96 billion) as of 2022, including annual synergies it was already planning to generate from its combination with Monsanto as of 2022. Overall, the planned cost savings would help free up funds for a planned €35 billion to be invested in the company’s future through the end of 2022, it said, with R&D accounting for two-thirds of this sum.

Analysts estimate that the sale of the animal-health unit, the smallest of the group’s four businesses, could fetch up to €7 billion ($8 billion) while a sale of Coppertone and Dr. Scholl’s could raise roughly €1 billion.

Thursday’s announcement initially lifted Bayer’s share price by up to 4%, but the stock later erased most of its gain and traded 0.7% lower.

While Bayer faced strategic challenges in its main activities before the Monsanto deal, the collapse of its share price in recent months and the uncertainty surrounding the Roundup lawsuits have raised pressure on management to improve the group’s outlook.

Bayer said the restructuring would help it focus on its life- science strategy—essentially its crops and drugs businesses. Analysts had called such a move inevitable after Bayer took on a large amount of debt—the company is targeting net debt of around €37 billion by the end of 2018—to fund the Monsanto deal.

In Crop Science, where Bayer is now the world’s largest provider of seeds and pesticides, the group said it would cut 4,100 jobs as it integrates the Monsanto acquisition. In pharmaceuticals, which now make up roughly half of total sales, the company said it would outsource more Research and Development activities through partnerships or licensing deals.

This overhaul—in the making for the past year under the code name “Super Bowl”—will ax some 900 job cuts in R&D, and an additional 360 through the closure of a production site in the German city of Wuppertal. The ensuing savings would be invested into external research deals, Bayer said.

Some 5,500 to 6,000 jobs at central corporate functions would also go, Bayer said, with all job cuts due to happen by the end of 2021. Bayer said it would cut a significant share of jobs in its home-market Germany.

The cuts come as Bayer is heading toward a period of slower sales growth in its prescription drugs as patents for top-selling drugs Xarelto and Eylea are due to expire from 2023. Analysts have been fretting over how Bayer planned to fill that looming gap.The consumer health division—which includes the flagship Aspirin brand—would see some 1,100 jobs go and the disposal of two brands—Coppertone and Dr. Scholl’s—whose sales had been sliding in recent quarters.

Sales and profits at the over-the-counter-drugs unit have been declining in recent quarters, partly because of tough competition in the U.S., where consumers have turned away from drugstores to cheaper, online shops. In the first nine months of 2018, sales fell 7.7% to €4.12 billion.

The decision to sell the animal-health unit follows weeks of Bayer exploring strategic options for a business it no longer sees as core and is too small to flourish under its ownership.

Mr. Baumann said Bayer had identified a number of potential buyers for the unit but that it wasn’t in advanced talks with any party.

The Rhineland-based company said it would also sell a 60% stake in chemical park operator Currenta, a company whose relevance had been waning since Bayer exited specialty chemicals business Covestro . Analysts say the Currenta stake could fetch between €1 billion and €2 billion.</s>Bayer, the German pharmaceuticals and chemicals group, has announced plans to cut 12,000 out of 118,200 jobs worldwide, in a bid to reduce costs and regain investor favour following a string of legal setbacks related to its Monsanto acquisition earlier this year.

The measures include a plan to exit the market for animal health products, as well as its Coppertone sun care and Dr Scholl’s foot care product lines. Bayer also plans to sell the group’s 60 per cent stake in service provider Currenta.

“Including the synergies expected from the acquisition of Monsanto, Bayer anticipates annual contributions of €2.6 billion from 2022 on as a result of its planned efficiency and structural measures,” the group said in a statement.

Werner Baumann, the Bayer chief executive, said: “With these measures, we are positioning Bayer optimally for the future as a life sciences company.”

The group’s shares have suffered a sharp decline in recent months, after a California court awarded $289 million in damages to a school groundskeeper with terminal cancer. The jury found that the man’s sickness was the direct result of his exposure to a widely-used weedkiller manufactured by Monsanto. The sum has since been reduced by a higher court, but analysts and investors worry that the avalanche of follow-up cases will be costly for Bayer all the same.

Bayer has had an operation in the Republic for almost 50 years and is based in south Dublin. – Copyright The Financial Times Limited 2018</s>Pharmaceutical giant Bayer to cut thousands of jobs and sell off business after Monsanto take-over.

The German pharmaceutical giant Bayer will cut 12,000 jobs globally and sell off a number of its businesses, after its takeover of agrochemical company Monsanto.

In August Bayer's shares dropped by more than a third, after a US jury awarded $US289 million ($396 million) in damages to a former school groundskeeper who said his terminal cancer had been caused by Roundup, a product made by Monsanto.

The damages were later reduced by a judge, but hundreds of other patients have made similar claims.

Monsanto disputes the judgement and has said the product is safe when used as directed but now faces more than 9,000 lawsuits over the alleged carcinogenic affects of Roundup.

About one in 10 workers will lose their jobs, with most going in Germany, and in a statement, Bayer Australia said it did know what the effect in Australia would be.

The animal health division, could be worth up to 7 billion Euros ($11AUD billion) and accounts for about 4.5 per cent of group revenues.

It also plans on selling its products Coppertone Sunscreen and Dr Scholl's foot care products.

Werner Baumann, Chairman of the Board of Management said the measures would ensure the business was sustainable.

"We have made very good progress with Bayer's strategic development in recent years.

"As we now proceed with these measures, we are laying the foundation to sustainably enhance Bayer's performance and profitability," said.

"With these measures, we are positioning Bayer optimally for the future as a life science company."
The German chemical and pharmaceutical company Bayer is to cut 12,000 jobs by the end of 2021 as part of an overhaul following its acquisition of Monsanto earlier in 2018.