Fears have been sparked of mass job cuts at one of Galway’s biggest employers, as Medtronic announced a series of layoffs in the face of “lower than expected revenue growth”.

The international MedTech giant, which employs over 3,000 people in Galway, confirmed to the Connacht Tribune that it had begun the process of cutting jobs, with notifications issued to some of the affected workers late last week.

“To better position the company for future growth, we announced this week that we intend to reduce our full-time global workforce in the coming months,” said a spokesperson.

The Connacht Tribune understands that a number of employees at the company’s Galway plants received emails confirming that a redundancy process was to get underway, with mid-May set as the commencement of layoffs.

A source in the multinational company said that so far, it was only staff in management positions, those above technician or engineer grades, human resource staff and administration workers who had received a notification.

“Staff on the line or on the factory floor haven’t received anything yet, but they are living in fear that a notice will come. Many of those workers aren’t there as long as more senior people, so they would require a shorter notice period,” said the source.

In a statement announcing the cuts, Medtronic said it had been impacted by inflation, the strong US Dollar and supply chain issues, all of which were hitting “margins and profitability”.

The job cuts were part of a “comprehensive effort underway to align our cost structure with our revenue and margins, while also ensuring that we’re protecting critical investment in the technology that holds the most promise and potential to benefit patient lives”.

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