Agfa has claimed its Horizon restructuring programme will increase productivity and cashflow and decrease working capital to allow it to invest in new technologies.

It expects to make savings of 343m (euro550m) per year from the changes, which may result in up to 4,000 redundancies. A third of the savings will come from Graphic Systems.

The bulk - 149m - will come from reduced production costs. It is planning to cut its 40 worldwide factories, closing smaller plants and concentrating on sites that currently have spare capacity. No decisions have been made about which factories will close.

Agfa is also planning to outsource some production, rationalise its product range and switch from analogue to digital products.

In Graphic Systems that means a reduction in film and conventional plate and an increase in CTP plate production and research and development.
Another big saving will come from cutbacks in its administration. It hopes to cut costs in this area, which currently represents 22% of the total workforce, by a third.

It plans to decrease working capital by around 20% from 1.6bn, to free up money for acquisitions, by reducing inventories and accounts receivable.

It has already begun its acquisition trail with this weeks purchase of newspaper pre-press firm Autologic and earlier this month buying 70% of Image Building, the firm behind its web-based print project management software, Delano.

Although it plans to cut sales and marketing costs by 47m it has no plans to cut back on sales and service staff.

Restructuring is expected to be complete by December 2003.

Chief executive Ludo Verhoeven (pictured) revealed the results of the review it carried out over the summer (PrintWeek, 29 June) and how it plans to change the business on Thursday 27 September.

Were a film company making plates and we need to be a plate company making film, said Agfa UK Graphic Systems Director Laurence Roberts.

Story by Barney Cox