Tag Archives: Element Six

SIPTU members in Element Six in Shannon have served management with notice of a 24-hour work stoppage which will begin on Wednesday, September 21 at 6.30am. SIPTU Organiser, Ray Mitchell, said: “Last month, our members voted overwhelmingly to take industrial action in response to the failure of management to fully implement a Labour Court recommendation in relation to changes of work practices and shift patterns at the industrial diamond manufacturing plant. “Since then, there has been no attempt by management to engage with our members to discuss the issues that have resulted in this dispute. SIPTU representatives remain available to meet with management to engage in serious negotiations to find a solution to the outstanding issues.” He added: “If management was to engage in negotiations with our members that were really aimed at finding a resolution to the issues in dispute, the upcoming action could yet be averted. It is now up to management to show its willingness to focus …

Retention of slots for Irish airports must be pre-requisite in any IAG take-over of Aer Lingus, a leading industrial figure in Shannon has warned. Mr Ken Sullivan, an executive director of Element Six, said that the ability to attract further investment into the region will be undermined by any threat to Shannon-Heathrow slots. He said that Government must make retention of slots for Shannon, as well as Cork and Dublin, a prerequisite for its agreement to any deal. “This region is every bit as dependent now on Shannon-Heathrow services as it was back in 2007 when the Shannon slots were moved temporarily to Belfast. The business community here united in opposition to that move and this time around the threat is not just to Shannon but also Cork and Dublin,” said Mr Sullivan, who was vice chairman of the Atlantic Connectivity Alliance – the group of business and tourism representatives that came together to seek the restoration of Shannon Heathrow …

ELEMENT Six are taking on another 40 staff in Shannon and say that there is likely to be scope for further growth due to a €25 million capital investment and the relocation of €20 million of assets to the Shannon plant. Five years ago the company announced redundancies and the overall number of Shannon employees dropped to 250. However it has since rebounded to around 360 and is now set to hit 400. Walter Huhn, Chief Executive of Element Six, was in Shannon on Wednesday and he said that the painful cost cutting measures introduced in Shannon have secured the future of the plant, and led to a situation where it is now expanding again. “We started the restructuring in Shannon five years ago with a very clear focus on what we wanted to achieve, what we had to achieve because the global market was changing and the competitive environment was changing. We had to be even more of a …

Exports from the Shannon Region are contributing in a major way to the national economy. This is highlighted in the 2014 edition of Top 250 Exporters in Ireland and Northern Ireland, published this week by the Irish Exporters Association (IEA), in association with Investec, a leading specialist bank and wealth and investment manager. The report highlights that eight companies in Shannon exported goods to the value of €1.5 billion across the ICT and life sciences sector in 2013. Google Ireland Ltd (Google) was named the largest exporting company, moving up one place from its previous year’s ranking. Google was followed by Microsoft Ireland Ltd (2nd, export turnover of €15bn), Johnson & Johnson (3rd, export turnover of €10.5bn), Dell Products (4th, export turnover of €8.6bn) and Smurfit Kappa Group (5th, export turnover of €7.3bn). Among the top exporters in the Shannon region are: 1. Phardiag Limited (ranked 69th): Life Sciences, €413m exports 2. Mentor Graphics Ireland (78): ICT, €353m exports 3. …

By Tim Healy MORE than 100 members of the  pension scheme of industrial diamond manufacturers, Element Six have lost a Commercial Court action against their trustees over the winding up of the fund. Mr Justice Peter Charleton this week  ruled the trustees of the pension scheme of the Shannon comnpany had acted reasonably and in the interests of the scheme members as a whole when they agreed in November 20011 to accept an offer to wind up the fund on the basis of a contribution of €37.1m from the company. The members sued the six trustees claiming breach of trust and conflict of interest in accepting the offer and said they should instead have demanded the company make a €129.2m contribution to make up the deficit in the scheme.   The claims were denied. The trustees, comprising three management nominees and three worker nominees,  accepted the €37m offer in a 3-3 vote in which the management nominee exercised his casting vote. …