Southern Cross Austereo (SCA) is set to stand down several of its employees this week as the economic impact of the coronavirus continues to hit hard.
As first reported on Radio Today, SCA CEO Grant Blackley sent an email to all employees on Tuesday, outline measures that will ensure the business will continue amid the pandemic. Some of those measures included standing down “full” and “partial” non-essential workers.
It is unknown just how many people will be stood down.
In the email, Blackley said: “Unfortunately, there are a small number of employees for whom there is no available work at all,” with some employees to be “fully stood down”.
According to RadioToday, the measures will impact all units, including sales and content.
Blackley confirmed SCA has applied the Government’s JobKeeper subsidy.
It follows a tumultuous time for SCA, which entered a trading halt Monday 24 March this year after its shares dropped 33.9 per cent to 16 cents. SCA’s shares had previously sunk to more than 29 per cent.
In a statement to the ASX, the media company said: “SCA advises that the trading halt is necessary to enable SCA to assess the impacts of the COVID-19 crisis on its business and to make an announcement to inform the market about those impacts and the actions being taken by SCA to address them.
SCA’s net debt, which was reported in February, was $330.5 million. Its market capitalisation was $188.4 million.
In its half year results the company revealed an 8.2 per cent drop in revenue to $308.11 million.
