GE says plans to cut 6500 jobs in Europe by 2017

It is understood that nearly 600 hundred of GE’s 22,000 British jobs could go at former Alstom sites in Rugby and Stafford which were acquired in the transaction.

GE had reached an agreement with Alstom in 2014 to purchase Alstom’s power and grid businesses for 12.35 billion euros.

The deal strengthened GE in several areas, such as servicing power-generating gas turbines, and also gave it access to renewable energy and power transmission markets.

Alstom is now focussing on its rail business including its TGV high-speed trains. The company won government support for the transaction by assuring that it will create 1,000 jobs in France.

The French government had previously given itself powers to block foreign takeover bids for companies deemed “strategic”.

A total of 765 jobs will be cut in France, with the majority of those made at Alstom’s headquarters in the Paris suburb of Levallois and at the electric grid unit, a spokesman for GE said Wednesday.

The acquisition from Alstom has expanded GE Power and Water, which is already the largest manufacturing unit of the company, as well as world’s top gas-turbine maker.

US-based giant General Electric are poised to cut up to 660 United Kingdom jobs as part of a shake-up, according to Sky sources.

The restructuring is just the latest in a run of mass redundancies to the hit the energy and engineering sector. He added that unions were informed Tuesday about the cuts and the talks would start Wednesday.