Waters laying off 4% of its workforce

Photo | TMS Aerial Solutions The Milford headquarters of Waters Corp.

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By Isabel Tehan

Milford life sciences firm Waters Corp. will lay off about 4% of its 8,200 employees worldwide, and most of the impacted Massachusetts employees will be at the Milford headquarters.

Staff at the laboratory equipment manufacturer were notified this week in an email from President and CEO Udit Batra. The email, obtained by WBJ, stated headcount and outside services would be reduced in response to the macroeconomic climate. Staff in the U.S. impacted by the layoffs would be notified in the 48 hours following the Wednesday email, it said.

In other parts of the company’s global operations, staff will be given 30 days notice in accordance with local regulations, Kevin Kempskie, Waters senior director for public relations, said in an email to WBJ.

"To ensure that we continue to invest in higher growth areas and position Waters for success, we are making some very difficult but necessary decisions to better align our headcount and outside services spending with our growth strategy. Looking forward, Waters will continue to invest in innovation, talent development, and capability-building. We will also continue to prioritize investments in our growth areas in order to deliver on the substantial opportunity we have ahead of us," Waters said in a statement Kempskie emailed to WBJ.

Waters has 1,800 employees at its operations in Central Massachusetts, according to data the company provided to the WBJ Research Department.

The company didn't disclose exactly how many Central Massachusetts employees would be laid off, but Kempskie said it's a small percentage and mainly at the Milford location.