Some 500 jobs have been shed at Apple Computer's plant in Cork city since July when the company's printed circuit board operations were transferred to the Far East.
The job losses have come in the shape of 150 full-time posts, a further 150 temporary staff and 200 voluntary redundancies, leaving a current workforce of 1,300. These are divided between full-time and temporary or contract positions.
Since July, Apple Cork has focused on the production of the company's latest powerful G3 processor products for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). These include the G3 Powerbook, G3 Minitower Product, and the G3 Desktop which is aimed at professional users requiring strong graphic capabilities.
But more significantly, the Cork facility has begun test manufacturing the iMac, Apple's great white hope. It is widely accepted the iMac will make or break the Cork operation - a prediction very much in keeping with the overall prognosis for the company. Next week the Cork plant will start iMac production for shipment to the EMEA regions.
According to Mr Bernard Cronin, human resource manager at Apple in Cork: "iMac has been one of the most successful product launches in the history of Apple. Here in Cork we are very excited about building this product for the European market, and the potential it holds to re-establish Apple in consumer, education and small business market segments."
If initial sales here since the iMac's launch on August 25th are anything to go by, the Cork plant has a lot to be optimistic about, according to Mr Robbie Hanlon, general manager of Apple Ireland.
He expects Apple will sell 10,000 iMac units in Ireland within the first year although initial sales of iMacs shipped from Singapore for the Irish market indicate that this figure could be even higher. Before the launch date, Apple Ireland already had 600 advance orders for computers.
Global predictions are also very upbeat, particularly for the European market, which is good news for Cork.
Global sales of PCs are expected to grow by 12.2 per cent in the second half of the year, according to market research group International Data Corporation, and the iMac is expected to fare best.
