tion, seeds, and animal health. Consumer Health includes companies such as Redline, Roland and Eden (PR Newswire, 1999). Each division operates in numerous countries. Novartis Group annually invests more than CHF 3.7 (USD 2.5) billion in Research & Development (R&D). The company is headquartered in Basel, Switzerland and employs about 82,000 people and operates in over 140 countries around the world (PR Newswire, 1999).
Since its creation, Novartis has undergone several lay-off periods worldwide (Shook, 1999). In June 1999, Novartis announced it would eliminate 1,100 jobs worldwide to counter a depressed farm economy (Craver, 1999). As part of those lay-offs, Novartis' North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) region headquarters for its Crop Protection subsidiary eliminated 40 positions in Greensboro, North Carolina (Craver, 1999). The job cuts represented 6 percent of Novartis Crop Protection's global work force. At the same time, Novartis also eliminated an additional 35 positions at a manufacturing facility in St. Gabriel, Louisiana.
Notably, however, employees who were terminated received at least 20 weeks of severance pay as well as a retraining allowance and assistance with COBRA medical insurance payments (Craver, 1999). At the time, Sherry Duvall, the company's manager of public relations in Greensboro, noted that most of their competitors were also experiencing the tough business climate that precipitated the lay-offs. In particular, the agriculture market was shrinking and the farm economy was in depression (Craver, 1999).
Following the lay-offs, in September 1999, Novartis announced a new strategy to deal with the upheaval and rapid change in the agribusiness industry (M2 Presswire, 9/1999). In particular, Novartis would make greater efforts to exploit joint synergies between its Crop Protection and Seeds Global market coverage. It would employ Crop Teams with representatives from both sectors for several crops (...