By Paul Vieira
Bombardier Inc. said Friday it will temporarily lay off 145
workers at a railcar plant in Quebec, citing a delay in getting a
component that is required in the construction of subway cars for
the Montreal transit system.
Workers at a factory in La Pocatière, Quebec, which is about 220
miles northeast of Montreal, will be laid off from late April to
late October, Bombardier spokesman Marc Laforge said. He said a
supplier acting for Alstom SA, Bombardier's partner in the
subway-car contract, has been delayed in providing the automated
control system needed for the trains.
Bombardier and Alstom are part of a consortium that received the
468-car Montreal subway contract in 2010. The company said at the
time that the contact was worth 1.2 billion Canadian dollars ($966
million at current exchange rates).
A spokeswoman for Alstom said there was an "unfortunate" delay
at the company contracted to build the automatic control system--
Ansaldo STS--but that the consortium is working to secure delivery
later this year.
A representative for Ansaldo, based in Genoa, Italy, wasn't
available for comment.
To date, the consortium has delivered 40 of the 468 cars that
make up the Montreal subway system order, Bombardier said.
The layoffs come as Bombardier experiences difficulties in its
aerospace division. The Montreal-based company has struggled to
reach its delivery timetable and sales goals for its CSeries
aircraft project and said earlier this month that it would halt
development of a new Learjet model. The halt in the Learjet program
will trigger 1,000 job losses and a $1.4 billion charge.
Bombardier is set to unveil fourth-quarter results on Feb.
12.
Write to Paul Vieira at paul.vieira@wsj.com
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