Sapa restructures extrusion business in Sweden

Sapa's aluminium extrusion unit in Sweden, Sapa Profiler AB, has informed its organization about restructuring of operations and consequent manning reductions. Union representatives have been notified and will begin local negotiations shortly.

Sapa's long-term strategy is to build strong and effective production units that meet the demands of local and regional customers. In order to optimize its production facilities and its organization to achieve Sapa’s long-term strategy, Sapa Profiler AB will focus its operations to areas where the company has a competitive advantage and invest in these. The changes have resulted in that the company has given notice to 185 employees, mainly within the manufacturing areas.

"Although we have a very strong market position in Sweden, recent improvements have not brought our profitability to a sustainable level. These changes are necessary to ensure that we are competitive over the long term," says Mari Wilhemsen, Sapa Profiler AB's managing director.

The investments include increasing the capacity in the remelt facility, adjusting the extrusion press setup to be more efficient, reducing anodizing capacity while upgrading the remaining anodizing line to fit actual market needs, as well as adjusting the internal fabrication capabilities to better meet the market needs.

The decisions were made after a long and thorough process carefully analyzing alternatives of adjusting the business to become more competitive. ”It is a major change we will be going through, but we are confident that it will reinforce our position as a world-class leading regional player,” says Wilhelmsen.

Sapa Profiler AB has approximately 1,000 employees and annual turnover of around SEK 2.4 billion. The market leader in Sweden, Sapa Profiler AB has production and sales activities in Vetlanda, Finspång, Gothenburg, Stockholm and Umeå. Sapa Profiler AB also has sales offices in Finland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. It is organized as part of Sapa's Nordic extrusion business.