Bunge Ltd.’s boss says the agricultural trader’s deal to buy Glencore-backed Viterra won’t lead to a cull of staffers.
The St. Louis-based company said Tuesday it agreed to buy Viterra for $8.2 billion in stock and cash, and that the combination will achieve $250 million of pretax savings within three years of the transaction’s completion.
But Bunge Chief Executive Officer Greg Heckman said the company has its biggest deal pipeline in years and wants to hang on to experienced workers. He plans to “unleash” growth by adding more people in areas such as regenerative agriculture, renewable feedstock, carbon and risk management.
Read More: Bunge-Viterra Deal Likely to Face Argentina Antitrust Scrutiny
“This isn’t a big cost-reduction play,” Heckman said in an interview. “We’ll find efficiencies, and no doubt, this is about productivity and we want to drive the profitability per employee and that’s not by reducing employees. That’s by increasing profitability.”
Globally, the combined company will ended up with more than 125 crushing and refining facilities, a processing capacity of over 75 million metric tons per year, 55 port terminals and more than 230 million metric tons of commodities marketed per year.
