Thales will cut 1,300 positions in its space activity and regroup them

A false scare on Thales’ side? The French company will eliminate and restructure 1,300 positions across the group, including 1,000 in France within its space branch Thales Alenia Space. A joint venture with Italian group Leonardo, of which Thales owns two-thirds, Thales Alenia Space currently employs 8,600 people, mainly in France and Italy.

According to Thales, “the restructuring will take place during the years 2024 and 2025 in consultation with the employee representative bodies.” “There will be zero forced departures, these are people who will continue to work for Thales, just on other activities,” CEO Patrice Kane said during a conference call with our colleagues at AFP.

Reference to market decline

Reason: Decline in demand in commercial telecommunication satellite segment, according to the company. Because if the space activity benefits from “favorable growth prospects in most of its activities”, the situation is more complicated for civil telecoms, while the activity represents about 700 million euros or a third of the figure of Thales Alenia Space.

“The main explanation is the reduction of the geostationary satellite market which, in the recent past was an average of twenty satellites per year and which is now stabilizing at around ten geostationary satellites per year (…) so we have to adapt,” explained. Patrice Cain.

Projects on a European scale

On the other hand, historical manufacturers such as Airbus and Thales are facing the rise of new players who deploy low-cost satellites and constellations in low orbits. Thales bosses, however, are pinning their hopes on the future European communications constellation Iris2 project, for which a consortium including Thales must be notified soon for the contract.

He also mentioned another Nakshatra project “under discussion”, without further details. According to Thales, “restructuring will take place during the years 2024 and 2025 in consultation with employee representative bodies.”