The move comes as margins face pressure from EV transition costs, US tariffs and intensifying competition in China.Premium carmaker BMW is to offer almost half its German staff voluntary redundancy in a bid to cut 8,000 jobs by the end of 2027, a company source told AFP Wednesday.
About 40,000 of BMW’s roughly 85,000 permanent German employees would receive the offers from October, the source said, adding that production line workers would be spared the cuts.
“The workforce will ultimately be reduced by around 8,000 people by the end of 2027,” the source said. “We’re planning on the basis of that.”
BMW employs about 154,000 people worldwide and the offer would be open to German employees in desk-based roles, the source said.
The plan had taken about six weeks to negotiate between the board and BMW’s works council, the source added.
Suffering from slimmer margins from the sale of electric cars, US tariffs and above all intense Chinese competition, German carmakers have sought to cut overheads.
Volkswagen is weighing up to 100,000 job cuts across its 10 brands and Mercedes-Benz has its own voluntary redundancy program.
Deciding early on to maintain petrol and diesel options for its customers, BMW has so far been widely seen to have weathered the storm better than its peers, avoiding costly strategy changes at the same time as seeing its electric sales rise.
But the carmaker issued a shock profit warning last month, saying that business in China was proving even worse than expected amid fierce competition and a sluggish economy.
BMW’s vehicle deliveries in China were last year already at their lowest level since 2017 and they fell 30 percent year-on-year in the three months to June.
