Ferrari employees staged a walk-out yesterday over plans to chop nine per cent of the company's workforce and shut down its Maranello engine plant for a week.
According to Ferrari spokesman Stefano Lai, the cutbacks are due to a slump in demand from sister company Maserati - for whom Ferrari makes V8 engines at Maranello.
The job cuts will include around 150 line workers and 120 office staff, while the engine plant shutdown - which starts on Monday - will mean the temporary laying-off of around 600 workers.
Part of the reason for the cuts, said Ferrari in a statement, is that the company is focusing its resources on product development, technological innovation and reaching new customers and has decided to outsource 'non-core' operations to local contractors in order to help protect workers on temporary contracts.
Ferrari's profit in the first quarter of 2010 dropped by 28 per cent to £43m, although it still expects to build 6250 cars this year - the same figure as it produced in 2009.
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