Spirit Aerosystems’ Wichita operation is trimming more employees as the aerospace manufacturer undergoes massive changes under new CEO Larry Lawson.
The company said Thursday afternoon that it would lay off an undetermined number of employees in Wichita from the management and salaried ranks.
Those cuts will begin next month and many will come through voluntary retirement and voluntary layoffs and will include severance packages.
“Today's announcement represents continued strategic moves by the company to become more competitive in a cost-sensitive environment,” an announcement from the company said.
This comes just weeks after
the company announced it would sell its Oklahoma facilities in Tulsa and McAlester.
Spirit also announced it was
cutting 360 positions back in July at its Oklahoma and Kansas facilities.
Lawson
told the Wichita Eagle today that he plans to focus the company on defense work, a competitive segment that has been even more clouded by sequester cuts and the winding down of operations in Afghanistan.
Lawson recently named a new chief financial officer, Sanjay Kapoor, most recently served as vice president, Integrated Air & Missile Defense, Integrated Defense Systems at Raytheon Company.
Lawson also moved former CFO Phil Anderson to the position of named senior vice president of defense and contracts, “with responsibility for all company contracting as well as solidifying the structure to allow Spirit to pursue more military work in the future.”
Spirit leaders are going all in to remake the company after disappointing results stemming from big losses on Gulfstream projects. Much of that Gulfstream work is done in Tulsa, a big reason the company wants to offload facilities here.
One thing to keep an eye on: The kind of middle management cuts announced today for Wichita are often a sign of a potential sale or merger, a company cutting from the middle to make its books look more attractive.
I don’t have any source on this, just experience.
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