Subic firm lays off 784 workers

By Patrick Roxas, TMT, Manila Times, 7 Jan 2021

Subic Philippines Corp. had retrenched 784 or more than 70 percent of its workers here to maintain the viability of its operations, the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA) said on Wednesday.

The firm — which manufactures precision electronic equipment, direct-drive spindle motors and specialized digital core parts for multimedia equipment — announced this on Tuesday along with the separation pay of its retrenched workers.

“It’s sad news for us, but we hope that this will be just a temporary setback that would allow the company to weather the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic on the global economy,” said SBMA Chairman and Administrator Wilma Eisma.

She added that the company would not close down, but would maintain 300 workers onsite at the Subic Techno Park here.

As of December 2020, the firm had listed 1,197 direct hires on its rolls, aside from the 211 workers sourced out from a manpower provider and 36 from a security firm.

But, as early as August last year, Nidec vice president for administration Tetsuya Nakao had announced business difficulties that impacted company operations at the Subic production facility.

In a letter asking the Department of Labor and Employment for exemption to the new minimum wage order, Nakao revealed that “the impact of coronavirus greatly affected our operating expense and doubled our company expenditures on shuttle services.”

In December, General Manager for Administration Daisy Mae Jaucian informed SBMA Labor Department Manager Melvin Varias that the firm would cut down the number of its employees with the closure of its base production of spindle motors effective February 5.

“We must reduce our workforce to ensure the financial stability of the company,” Jaucian said. “We have always valued and continue to value the contributions of all our employees and deeply regret the need for this action.”

Varias said Nidec had asked assistance from the SBMA for the profiling of the displaced workers for any job opening in the Subic Bay Freeport.

In response, Varias said the SBMA had identified 254 job vacancies within 15 companies in the Freeport as of January 6 that could accommodate the retrenched workers.

The available positions included, among others, 150 production operators and 15 quality control personnel in a shoe factory; 21 engineer, operator and inspector positions in a computer manufacturing firm; and production planners in another Japanese firm.