Industry Head of Steel at Thyssenkrupp announces tougher cuts

Dennis Grimm, the new head of the steel division of Germany's largest steel group Thyssenkrupp, has announced tougher cuts than previously planned. In an interview, Grimm left open how many jobs will be lost.

"The current market situation has deteriorated again in recent months, and unfortunately there is no recovery in sight," said Grimm in Saturday's "Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung". Germany's largest steel group must react to this. The cuts could therefore be less severe than previously planned.

A new business plan is currently being drawn up, said Grimm. "We cannot yet put an exact figure on how many people we will employ once the business plan has been finalized and negotiations with employee representatives have been completed. But it will be fewer than today," said the new CEO.

Job cuts already announced

The Thyssenkrupp steel division is Germany's largest steel producer. It employs 27,000 people, 13,000 of whom work in Duisburg alone. The division has been suffering from the economic downturn and cheap imports for a long time. This is one of the reasons why it has to reduce capacity.

In April, the Group announced "as yet unquantifiable job cuts". The planned measures were "absolutely necessary to maintain competitiveness in order to lead steel production at the Duisburg site into a secure future" and to secure jobs in the long term, it said at the time.