335 Layoffs Announced At Stericycle

LAKE FOREST, IL — Medical waste disposal company Stericycle is laying off hundreds of employees as part of a restructuring plan approved Tuesday. According to a notice filed Thursday with the U.S. Securities & Exchange Commission, the Lake Forest-based company has cut about 335 employees from its payroll.

Stericycle said its "restructuring plan and other recent headcount reductions" would lead to an estimated 7 to $10 million in severance costs, according to the filing.

The company has not responded to queries about whether any local jobs had been eliminated or would be eliminated as part of what the company described in its filing as a "a comprehensive multi-year initiative with the objective of transforming [Stericycle's] business processes, systems and organizational design to enable future profitable growth."

The company has 25,500 employees and was founded in 1989, according to its website. The layoffs announced this week would represent 1.3 percent of its overall workforce.

The company handles medical waste like blood, used needles and gloves for hospitals and health care providers. It grew by more than 19 percent and generated $3.56 billion in revenue last year, even as its stock price declined by nearly 50 percent.

Stericycle's most recently reported earnings numbers show its third quarter revenue was down by 0.8 percent, gross profit was down 2.1 percent and earnings per share fell by 43.1 percent compared to the same quarter a year prior.

So far in 2017, it has been seeking to cut costs, having already consolidated operations and undergone previous layoffs, especially in Brazil. In August, the company said it is cooperating with a federal investigation into whether it violated the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act after it received subpoenas for company records related to its business practices in Latin America.

Some of its Stericycle's leaders have also been the subject of lawsuits accusing them of violating securities laws by failing to share information with investors and insider trading.

Last month, the company agreed to a $295 million settlement to end a class action suit filed in November 2013. The suit accused Stericycle of automatically inflating customers' bills up to 18 percent biannually, according to a press release from the law firm that brought it.

_{Top photo: Stericycle's Lake Forest headquarters | Google Street View}