CAE to lay off 2,600 as firm plans to make ventilators
Montreal-based CAE, best known for producing flight simulators, announced on Monday it was temporarily laying off 2,600 of its 10,500 employees as well as embarking on the manufacture of medical ventilators for patients in intensive care units.
In a statement issued Monday morning, the company announced also that it was temporarily suspending its common share dividend and share repurchase plan.
The moves come after CAE’S civil aviation operations were shaken by “the unprecedented disruption of the global air transportation system” created by the COVID -19 pandemic.
CAE said it was able to reduce the number of temporary layoffs by reducing capital expenditures and research and development spending. It also cut the salaries of several executives, with CEO Marc Parent taking a 50-per-cent pay cut while vice-presidents’ salaries dropped by 30 per cent. Rank and file employees saw their paycheques reduced by 10 per cent.
The company said that “as details of government assistance programs around the world are finalized, CAE will do everything it can to recall as many employees as possible.”
Meanwhile, CAE engineers and scientists have, in the space of 11 days, designed a “simple, maintainable, easy-to-manufacture ventilator prototype to provide life support to patients in intensive care. CAE is currently sourcing components in order to begin production of this ventilator as soon as it is approved by Health Canada.”
Once that approval is received, the company intends to produce “thousands of units in our Montreal plant and in other sites over the next few months.”
CAE is also launching simulation-based programs to train health-care personnel in the safe practice of ventilation and intubation.