Par Guillaume Laurens
Published on
updated on 9 Feb 23 at 12:05
The aeronautical group presented it as “the factory of the future”. Inaugurated less than five years ago in the Montredon area, in Toulousethe brand new factory of Latécoère will be relocated… to Mexico and the Czech Republic, we learned this Wednesday, February 8, 2023 from union sources.
“A generation factory” and fully robotized
In May 2018, the equipment manufacturer had inaugurated this new production site to the east of the Pink City with great fanfare. ” Factory connected, digitized and automated”, then boasted of the group, which mass-produces aircraft doors for the main manufacturers, and which had been extended from 2019. Head of industrial innovation within the Latécoère groupJean-Michel Tremoulet praised at the time the virtues of this “new generation” plant, and robotized at willsupposed to make it possible to “reduce production cycle times, reduced from several months to a few weeks”.
150 jobs (and machines) disappear in Toulouse
At the end of January 2023, the news fell during a meeting of the group’s Social and Economic Committee (CSE): “The management told us the relocation of the entire activity of the Montredon plant, and the closure of that of Labège”, sums up Florent Costessecretary of the CGT, the first union at Latécoère. Nearly 150 jobs will be impacted in the Pink City. “The relocation would be carried out gradually by the end of 2024”, explains Florent Costes.
“The 109 workstations of the so-called factory of the future in Montredon, and the automated machines, will be entirely relocated to the Czech Republic and Mexico (to other group sites, editor’s note). The Labège factory, where there was still a hundred jobs, will close: 36 jobs will be relocated to Tunisia, the others will move to Montredon”.
“They notoriously laughed at us”
Concretely, the management would therefore consider moving to Montredon the activities carried out in Labège, but also on its site in Colomiers, where the group would close its two entities. On arrival, the aeronautical subcontractor would only have the sites of Montredon, Gimont (Gers) and its headquarters in the rue de PérioleIn Toulouse.
“They are not closing the Montredon factory, but are removing everything that is in it. They notoriously laughed at us…”.
“There will necessarily be layoffs”, says the CGT
According to Florent Costes, “the CSE has made a unanimously negative opinion” to this decision, “but management clearly does not intend to negotiate. After those of 2016 and 2021, this is the third social plan at Latécoère. The anger is palpable, ”says the CGT secretary. At the end of a meeting, this Tuesday, February 8, the inter-union decided in unison to “work very actively to next steps”.
What will become of Latécoère employees? If the management assures that the job cuts in Toulouse “is not at all the objective” and says that it has “internal needs / solutions”, the trade unionist does not believe a word of it: “The management says that she wants to reclassify everyone, but it is not possible. There are only 63 positions open today in Toulouse and Gimont. Not to mention the incompatibility of missions and professions, how to reclassify 109 people out of 63 posts? There will necessarily be layoffs at the end”.
“A bad investment, which we had denounced”, says the CGT
Why such a change of course? According to the trade unionist, “the management invokes economic reasons, linked to the Covid, as well as to the setbacks of the Boeing 787, which is exposed to serious difficulties. However, it is an important program in the activity of Latécoère, which suffers from it”. Still according to Florent Costes, “according to management, there are also structural reasons”.
“To justify themselves, the management argues that the market for the production of elementary parts is very competitive, with many players, and therefore the plant would struggle to find profitability. It is therefore a bad investment, which we had denounced in 2016, since we said that it made no sense to create a factory specializing in the production of basic parts…”.
Management says it wants to “ensure the sustainability” of Latécoère in Montredon
Asked by Toulouse News, Latécoère assumes its desire to “change the nature of the activities of Toulouse-Montredon”. It confirms that “the activities of production of elementary parts” will be “grouped on third sites of the group (Prague, Hermosillo)”, because, admits the management, of “substantial gains in competitiveness”. The company, which is careful not to comment on the relocation of its state-of-the-art machines abroad, prefers to mention “the optimization of the establishment in Toulouse”, and pledge that “this development would represent an opportunity for Montredon to reconnect with growth and profitability to, she says, “ensure its sustainability over the long term”.
It thus underlines that “the site would host new cutting-edge activities”, in particular “a unique device in Europe for composite prototyping” currently being installed and which “should be operational in the first half of the year”, as well as service and maintenance activities. currently on the sites of Colomiers, Périole, or Labège. The latter being “three-quarters empty since September 2021 and the layout in the new headquarters”.
47 million euros, including public money
The group that bears the name of Pierre-Georges Latécoerea pioneer of Aéropostale in Toulouse, is now owned by the american pension fund Searchlight Capital Partners. He had invested 47 million euros in the 9,000 m factory2 in Montredon, with the support of authorities. Less than five years later, the activity will therefore be relocated. “We asked in CSE how much the local collectives had given, the management did not answer us”, still regrets Florent Costes.
“From what we know, the Métropole had provided the land for Montredon, and the Region had given the money”.
The trade unionist calls on these public actors to to take a position “It would be good for them to speak out, because giving public money for a relocated factory five years later is a scandal”.
What have the local authorities given to Latécoère?
At the Capitol, it is said “that a 3-hectare plot, property of the City” of Toulouse had been “sold for 1.3 million euros” to the company, but it is assured that “neither the Metropolis nor the Town Hall , did not give a subsidy to Latécoère”.
Asked, the Occitanie Region has not yet reacted. The community would have granted various financings to Latécoère, within the framework of the regional aeronautical plan Ader 4, but also for the automation of processes, during the creation of the Montredon factory.
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