Nestlé Restructuring Plan
After being appointed only in September 2025, Nestlé’s CEO Philipp Navratil announced this Thursday, 16.10.25, the elimination of 16,000 positions over two years, including 12,000 office jobs.
“The world is changing, and Nestlé needs to change faster” he said, adding : “This will include making hard but necessary decisions to reduce headcount over the next two years. We will do this with respect and transparency.” Nestlé
These job cuts are part of Nestlé’s structural strategy program aimed at sustainably reducing its costs and strengthening its competitiveness : “Along with other measures, we are working to substantially reduce our costs, and today we are increasing our savings target to CHF 3.0 billion by the end of 2027.”
A large-scale cost-cutting operation
This large-scale operation is divided into two main components:
- the dismissal of 12,000 office employees, which would allow the Nestlé group to achieve annual savings of CHF 1 billion starting in 2027:
“Includes c. 12,000 white-collar professionals across functions and geographies, driving annual savings of CHF 1.0 billion by end of 2027 (doubled versus original plan of CHF 0.5 billion); related one-off restructuring costs expected at two times annual savings.” Nestlé
- the dismissal of 4,000 employees across production and supply chains in order to increase productivity, reduce fixed costs, and modernize factories as well as logistics:
“Further c. 4,000 headcount reduction as part of ongoing productivity initiatives in manufacturing and supply chain.” Nestlé
A transition toward automation and AI
However, these job cuts will be partially offset by automation, digitalization, and industrial AI.
It is already known that Nestlé uses AI-based visual inspection systems to refine its quality controls. Forbes
For his part, Christophe Kauffmann, federal secretary of the CFDT and union coordinator at Nestlé, spoke this Thursday on Franceinfo : “On ne va pas laisser 16 000 postes disparaître comme ça, sans rien dire”, later emphasizing the role of AI: “Mais je pense que l’intelligence artificielle est un des éléments, vu ce que Monsieur Navratil a dit, qu’il souhaitait une structure plus simple, plus efficace, numériquement plus moderne…” BFMBusiness
Toward a better future for Nestlé?
It remains to be seen whether Philipp Navratil will succeed in achieving his ambitious goal of reaching CHF 3 billion in savings by the end of 2027.
The new CEO is betting on a massive transformation of the group, combining restructuring, automation, and innovation, but this is raising concerns, particularly due to the 16,000 job cuts out of 277,000 employees that is, 5.8% of the total workforce. Nestlé
A bold gamble that will shape the future of Nestlé.
