New Jersey’s job market is taking another hit, this time from pharma giant Johnson & Johnson, which is parting ways with 56 employees in New Brunswick, according to a Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification (WARN) Act posting for the state. The layoffs will take effect on August 21.
This is J&J’s first announced workforce reduction of this year, according to a tally by BioSpace. But the pharma has for years been constantly reshaping its business to accommodate the loss of exclusivity of its autoimmune disease powerhouse Stelara—a campaign that has involved cutting back investments in other parts of its business, while putting more money into higher-value areas like cancer.
Other Big Pharma players to recently slash their New Jersey headcounts include Novartis, Bristol Myers Squibb and Novo Nordisk.