Aerospace and defence company may slash 300 jobs

Marshall of Cambridge Holdings Ltd is a privately-owned company based at Cambridge Airport whose sectors include aerospace and defence

An aerospace company is putting up to 300 roles at risk of redundancy following "a challenging 2023".

Cambridge Airport-based Marshall Group said the posts going were "primarily within our support and administrative functions".

The government recently announced the company would receive £40m to develop a new fuel system for zero emission aircraft, while Sweden signed a £100m defence contract with the firm in May.

Interim chairman Roger Hardy said it had "launched a voluntary redundancy programme and hope to keep the need for compulsory redundancies to an absolute minimum".

Affected jobs were in administration and support, the company said

The company, which employs about 2,000 people worldwide, recorded "a modest, pre-tax, pre-exception profit of £4.1m" following "a challenging 2023", it said.

Mr Hardy said it was now focused on "addressing underlying programme delivery issues, improving the competitiveness of our cost base and taking a more systematic approach to pursuing and winning business".

"We will shortly begin formal consultation with those colleagues, and their representatives, who are potentially impacted," he said.

Those affected work for its Skills Academy and also for its standalone Futureworx team, which focuses on development work in the areas of sustainable aviation and autonomous platforms and is based at the city's St John's Innovation Centre.

Both operations would be transferred to the core business.

Many of the people in the teams will transition to the new working model, but some will be at risk of redundancy, the company said.

Finally, a proposal to relocate its land operations for ground defence, to a new purpose-built facility at Alconbury Weald, near Huntingdon, will no longer go ahead.

The company's chief executive officer Kathy Jenkins left the company in May.

The board thanked her for working tirelessly for the group.