Up to 125 positions will be eliminated at Bosch Rexroth Corp. in Northampton County because of a downturn in the mobile and industrial applications industry, the company said.
Manufacturing and distribution operations will cease in four of Bosch Rexroth’s seven buildings on two campuses in Bethlehem and Bethlehem Township beginning this fall and continuing into 2017, said Linda Beckmeyer, a spokeswoman at the company’s North American headquarters in Farmington Hills, Mich.
The company, a division of the Bosch Group, headquartered in Germany, has 560 employees.
Most of the job cuts and shuttered operations will be at its main campus at Lehigh Valley Industrial Park I on City Line Road, Bethlehem, where three of five buildings will no longer be occupied, Beckmeyer said.
Bosch Rexroth “has experienced a significant reduction in orders, which is resulting in increasing cost pressure,” Beckmeyer said.
“Since the company does not expect an improvement in the near future, it must adapt its production structure in Bethlehem to secure competitiveness and profitability in this challenging market.”
Job cuts will begin in the fourth quarter of 2016, with the remainder happening in 2017, Beckmeyer said.
Bosch Rexroth intends to transfer the majority of its mobile control production, service and distribution center from Bethlehem Township to other manufacturing sites in the company and local suppliers in the U.S. by mid-2017, she said.
The service and distribution center for mobile controls will be transferred to its plant in Fountain Inn, S.C.
“Bosch Rexroth intends to reduce the manufacturing depth of compact hydraulics production in Bethlehem and use more prefabricated components from local suppliers and other Bosch Rexroth plants,” Beckmeyer said.
“At the same time, the manufacturing capacity of compact hydraulics in Bethlehem will be reduced in line with the decreased customer demand.”
Bosch Rexroth opened its first Lehigh Valley location nearly 50 years ago in Easton before relocating to Bethlehem Township.
In 2014, the company expanded operations when it opened a $2.2 million, 150,000-square-foot distribution and logistics center on Brodhead Road. A second building on the site manufactures mobile, compact controls and industrial hydraulics and included products for John Deere and for the Panama Canal expansion.
Workers whose jobs have been eliminated can apply for jobs elsewhere in the company, Beckmeyer said.
