March 23 (SeeNews) - Slovenian blue-chip hand tools manufacturer Unior [LJE:UKIG] is reducing production to adjust it to a fall in orders caused by the coronavirus pandemic, it said on Monday.
The company is forced to curtail production due to a decrease or complete absence of demand from buyers in the last several days, as well as in an attempt to safeguard the health of its employees, Unior said in a statement.
Unior has suspended as of Monday its Forge programme, which is focused on drop forging of steel and is the company's oldest manufacturing programme on the basis of which Unior was built. The Hand Tools programme will continue to operate this week in order to complete production on orders in progress.
The Special Machines programme, on the other hand, which is intended for the needs of the automotive industry, is continuing to operate normally since there have been no changes in orders yet.
Unior also said it has reduced the number of employees in all still active manufacturing areas and has split the production processes into several shifts as a preventive measure against the spread of the disease.
"Since the circumstance in the country and in the European Union are on the whole very uncertain and are quickly changing, we cannot at this moment make any estimate on the impact of the current measures and events on the operations of Unior d.d.," the company said.
Unior's shares closed 4% lower at 9.6 euro ($10.3) on Monday on the Ljubljana Stock Exchange.
($=0.927847 euro)