Siemens Healthineers announced today that it intends to close its Fast Track Diagnostics Unit in a move that affects just shy of 100 workers.

The business closure affects about 90 employees, mostly based in Luxembourg. The company has conversations underway with local employee representatives and plans to follow local labor regulations and guidelines in accordance with standard company practice. It expects to complete the closure by September 2024.

Fast Track Diagnostics first became a part of the Siemens Healthineers portfolio through an acquisition completed in December 2017. The collection of polymerase chain reaction (PCR) testing products comprised part of the company’s overall Diagnostics business. Siemens Healthineers said in a news release that it primarily sells this portfolio in Europe.

Since the COVID-19 pandemic’s peak, the company observed a significant decline in demand for the portfolio’s offerings. Fast Track Diagnostics plays a minor role in the molecular diagnostics space, the company said, while delivering a “very small part of the overall revenue” for the company’s diagnostics business.

Following a strategic review, Siemens Healthineers decided to shutter the unit. It wants its diagnostics business to focus on centralized laboratory testing, specialty testing and point-of-care diagnostics. The company currently offers in vitro diagnostic tests for nearly every clinical environment. It also has differentiated offerings with flexible, scalable and integrated automation capabilities.

The latest round of layoffs brings the number of jobs cut at Siemens Healthineers to more than 450 over the past year. The company eliminated 67 roles at a diagnostics facility in Flanders, New Jersey, in June 2023, then confirmed the layoffs of 300 employees at its Morris, New Jersey location in November 2023.

We compiled a list of the layoffs that have hit medtech over the past couple of years here.