April 22 (Reuters) - Automotive seating supplier Adient

plc ( ADNT ) on Monday said it was restructuring its Europe

business by cutting jobs and transferring work to countries with

lower labor expenses, in a bid to cut costs.

The company did not disclose how many employees were

affected by the layoffs or which countries it is shifting roles

to. As of September 2023, Adient had over 70,000 employees

worldwide, with about 42% of them working in the Europe, Middle

East and Africa (EMEA) region.

European automakers face a trifecta of challenges: soft

demand due to higher borrowing costs that discourage car

purchases, fierce competition from Chinese rivals, and higher

input costs squeezing their margins.

Adient supplies seats to some of Europe's biggest

automakers, including Stellantis ( STLA ), Renault,

BMW, Mercedes Benz and Volkswagen

, as well as American giants Ford and General

Motors ( GM ).

The company's sales suffered in the first quarter ended Dec.

31, as the UAW strikes affected production volumes in the United

States.

Adient's new round of layoffs and the rest of the

restructuring would result in a charge of about $125 million in

the company's fiscal second quarter. The plan would be completed

by fiscal 2027, the company said, adding it expects about $60

million in reduced annual operating cost.

The company had outlined a restructuring plan earlier this

year, including workforce reductions of about 13,000 employees,

its first-quarter regulatory filing showed.