Vestas extends job cull

The world's top wind turbine maker, Vestas of Denmark, announced on Wednesday that it would have to slash another 1,400 jobs by the end of the year in addition to the more than 2,300 positions already cut at the beginning of the year.

"The further reduction in the workforce is part of the continued cost-saving plans which Vestas has been working on since November 2011," Chief Executive Ditlev Engel said in a statement.

He added that it was always unfortunate to say goodbye to good colleagues. "But we have said before that 2012 will be tough for us and 2013 will be even tougher, and in order to reach our target of making next year profitable, the move is unfortunately a necessity", Engel said.

The additional job cuts will take the company's work force down to 19,000 by the end of the year,

Profits in negative territory

The reduction in staff is meant to increase Vestas' fixed costs savings from 150 million euros ($186.9 million) to 250 million euros.

Vestas' announcement coincided with the firm's presentation of second-quarter results. The company, which has been affected by global overcapacity and sinking prices in the wind turbine business, saw sales rising by 15 percent to 1.6 billion euros between April and June.

But Vestas still posted a net loss of eight million euros for the second quarter, down from 71 million euros in the same quarter last year. The company's shares had risen by 1.33 percent after an hour of trading on the Copenhagen stock market on Wednesday.

hg/ipj (AFP, dpa)