The ax is falling at Glaxo-SmithKline's Zebulon facility. Workers will find out today who among them will be laid off.

A spokeswoman for the British drug maker confirmed Thursday that about 70 of the 1,050 employees at the pill production and packaging plant will lose jobs.

Workers at the plant have known for some time that cuts could be coming. GSK, which employs an additional 5,000 at its Research Triangle Park campus, started companywide cutbacks in late October.

The company is trying to save as much as $1.4 billion in annual costs over three years.

Since October, GSK has cut an undisclosed number of jobs at its U.S. headquarters in RTP and let go of temporary workers and contractors at the Zebulon plant. GSK, which had been promised state and local incentives tied to job growth, forfeited $1.4 million because of the layoffs.

Laid-off Zebulon workers will be out of a job in about 60 days, at which time they will receive severance pay and outplacement counseling, company spokeswoman Melinda Stubbee said Thursday.

Tom McPhatter of staffing agency Aerotek Scientific in Raleigh, which helps drug makers find employees, said laid-off workers who have college degrees should have little trouble finding new jobs in the Triangle's biotech industry.

Production workers with high school diplomas, especially those who acquired very specialized skills as they came up through the ranks at GSK's Zebulon plant, could have more difficulties.

McPhatter said that several manufacturers in the area are hiring, but they may not be a perfect match and tend to pay less, he said. Some of the laid-off GSK workers may eventually take jobs in other industries.

Today's job cuts may not be the end of layoffs in Zebulon, which is one of GSK's largest U.S. manufacturing facilities.

Industry's tough times

Like other pharmaceutical companies -- Pfizer, AstraZeneca and Bayer have announced job cuts in sales and research and development -- GSK is fighting generic competition and unexpected regulatory delays. Demand for four of its pills made or packaged in Zebulon is expected to drop this year because of competition from cheaper generics. GSK had pushed development of new treatments to replace the sales that it expected to lose, but regulatory approval of some of the new drugs has been delayed.

The $1.4 million in state incentives that GSK forfeited was tied to expansion plans announced in August 2005.

GSK had planned within a year to start production of Treximet, a migraine pill that promised to become a blockbuster seller. But regulatory approval of Treximet has been delayed for more than 18 months.

$1 billion in lost sales

GSK also lost about $1 billion in sales last year after a study published May 21 linked its best-selling diabetes treatment, Avandia, to an increased risk of heart attack. Avandia is packaged at the Zebulon plant.

"Given our current production volume at the factory and the regulatory environment, there could be further staff reductions," Stubbee said.

Economic development recruiters have attracted biotech and pharmaceutical manufacturing jobs to give production workers more options in the Triangle, said Ken Atkins, executive director of Wake County Economic Development.

Merck plans to bring on line within a year a vaccine manufacturing plant north of Durham. Novartis is building a plant in Holly Springs to make flu vaccine.

In addition, several companies are expanding, including Novozymes in Franklinton and Biogen Idec in RTP, Atkins said.

"Long-term, the outlook for job demand is good," he said.

But he acknowledged that some of the laid-off GSK production workers may encounter difficulties finding new jobs right away.

McPhatter's best suggestions for the GSK workers looking for new jobs included DSM Pharmaceuticals, a contract manufacturer in Greenville and Sandoz and Perdue Pharmaceuticals in Wilson.

For those who want to continue to work in Zebulon, he mentioned Nomacorc, which makes synthetic wine corks.