Fokker to start layoffs next month

Aircraft maintenance company Fokker Services is expected to announce layoffs in mid-February, newspaper Het Financieele Dagblad reported. The firm works exclusively on maintenance of Fokker aircraft built before the company went bankrupt in 1996. Headquartered in Papendrecht with a base in Hoofddorp, the company has 700 employees in the Netherlands and another 200 abroad. Fewer Fokker aircraft are in use as the planes get older and new technologies emerge. Many of the planes still flying are based so far away it is not practical for the Dutch company to provide service to them, a spokesperson told the newspaper. A Fokker 70 owned by KLM flies over Bristol, England, Aug. 2005 (Adrian Pingstone/Wikimedia) Fokker Services is under the umbrella of Fokker Technologies. Formerly known as Stork NV, the company took over Fokker's repair unit after the bankruptcy and rebranded Stork using the historic name of the aircraft builder first founded in 1912.