It has been reported that half the staff at the Elan pharmaceutical plant in Athlone have volunteered for redundancy following last week's announcement of 250 job cuts at the plant.
Management are refusing to make any comment on the details of the redundancy package offered.
Meanwhile, a Reuters report quotes sources close to the situation as saying that Elan is unlikely to complete the sale of its three anti-infective drugs - Abelcet, Azactam and Maxipime - before the end of the year.
Elan has appointed investment bank Morgan Stanley to advise it on asset disposals through which it hopes to raise $1.5 billion by the end of 2003. It did not specify which assets would be sold, but the report said it was hoping to receive at least $750m for the three medicines.
