Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: TUESDAY, July 4, 1995                   TAG: 9507050097
SECTION: BUSINESS                    PAGE: B-6   EDITION: HOLIDAY 
SOURCE: ASSOCIATED PRESS
DATELINE: FRANKFURT, GERMANY                                LENGTH: Medium

HOECHST TO CUT 8,000 MEDICINE JOBS

Germany's Hoechst chemicals group plans to cut about 8,000 jobs in its pharmaceuticals division by the end of 1997, the company said Monday.

The company said that the cuts are necessary because of ``synergies and overlaps'' stemming from Hoechst's recently announced plan to integrate its pharmaceuticals activities.

The job cuts began in January 1993 and thus far have been accomplished solely by attrition, said a company spokesman who refused to be named. He did not say how many job had been cuts so far.

The company could not rule out layoffs in the last two years of the program, he said.

The reductions are expected to be completed by the end of 1997, the company said, resulting in savings of more than $719 million.

While the company specified that 1,400 of the job cuts would be in Germany, it gave no breakdown on where the other 6,600 personnel cuts would take place.

In the United States, Hoechst is completing its purchase from Dow Chemical Co. of Marion Merrell Dow. The company's American unit, Hoechst Celanese Corp., operates a cigarette filter fibers plant at Narrows, Va.

Hoechst said last month it planned to reorganize its worldwide pharmaceutical activities to integrate newly acquired Marion Merrell Dow into its existing pharmaceuticals lines.

Hoechst is one of Germany's big-three chemical groups, active in colors, fibers, polymers, pharmaceuticals and agricultural chemicals.

About half of its worldwide sales are in European Union countries.

The company reported group sales of about $35.7 billion last year, with a net profit of $978.4 million.