A.H. ROBINS TO CUT ABOUT 370 RICHMOND JOBS

A.H. ROBINS TO CUT ABOUT 370 RICHMOND JOBS by Feb. 1 as part of the early steps of folding the company into American Home Products. Two-thirds of the cuts will come through an early retirement plan for employees who have reached the age of 55 with ten years or more of continuous service to Robins; about 140 jobs are being terminated through "involuntary separations." Following the shakeup, Robins expects to be left with approximately 1,100 employees in the Richmond area. Many of the jobs being eliminated are in Robins' research and development division, according to the company. The Richmond R&D activities will be relocated to other American Home Products research facilities. Robins' international management operations will also be reassigned to other AHP divisions. The Robins' pharamaceutical division management will relocate "later in the year" to the Wyeth-Ayerst headquarters in Radnor, Pennsylvania. Consumer product sales and marketing, as well as manufacturing operations, are slated to remain in Virginia, and Robins has stated that it anticipates no cuts in its 800-person sales force or in manufacturing, packaging and quality assurance personnel. The company plans to expand its Chapstick manufacturing facility in suburban Richmond and says it intends to produce additional products in Richmond in the future. At the time of the hot, three-way bidding war for Robins in early 1988, AHP Chairman Jack Stafford assured the Robins family members that AHP expects "that a substantial presence of the Robins company will remain in Richmond in the future and will continue to operate under the Robins name as part of AHP." Both Robins family members in management left the company the day the merger was completed on Dec. 15, 1989. The reins of the company were turned over to an AHP corporate VP, Joseph Carr, who was previously in finance and administration at Wyeth-Ayerst. A recent American Home Products statement on the Robins' acquisition, entitled "An Expanded Commitment to Health Care," raises the possibility of further consolidation moves. AHP declared that it "expects" Robins to "contribute to our earnings from day one, principally through continued sales growth and cost savings to be achieved from synergies in manufacturing, research and development and marketing." In the vein of reassuring the investment community that the purchase will not have any detrimental effects on the steady AHP growth pattern, the company announced a 10% dividend increase on Jan. 25 and approved a two-for-one stock split for ratification at the April 18 annual meeting. The AHP merger statement spotlights the strong Robins OTC brands: Robitussin, Dimetapp, and Chapstick. AHP notes that Dimetapp and Robitussin lead their product categories in non-prescription recommendations by physicians. Robitussin remains the number one OTC cough preparation with 32% of the cough category market compared with 18% for its nearest competitor. The AHP statment also celebrates the acquisition of Robins prescription products including hypertension treatment Tenex (guanfacine HCl,antiarrhythmic Quinidex Extentabs (quinidine sulfate), and number-one selling potassium supplement Micro-K Extencaps. Two of the AHP senior execs involved in the Robins bid, Wyeth-Ayerst Chairman Bernard Canavan and AHP's chief financial officer Robert Blount were added to the company's expanded 13-member board on Jan. 25. Canavan, 54, will be broadening his responsibilities beyond Wyeth-Ayerst to management of "additional American Home Products health care operations."