J&J to combine subsidiaries, cut 400 jobs

NEW BRUNSWICK, N.J. Johnson & Johnson has announced that it will combine two of its subsidiaries, Ortho Biotech and Centocor, which will lead to about 400 jobs being cut, according to published reports.

The move is a response to the declining sales of a class of anemia drugs that includes J&J’s Procrit, a company spokesman said. Prescriptions for Procrit fell sharply last year after the Food and Drug Administration placed new safety warnings on the drugs.

“It is important that we take these significant and difficult steps in our business to free up resources that can be redeployed to opportunities that will make the greatest difference to patients and to our own future success as a business,” Kristine Peterson, J&J’s company group chair for biotechnology, immunology and oncology, said in an e-mail to workers.

Ortho Biotech will move its operations to Centocor’s headquarters in Pennsylvania.