A court has curbed a second general strike planned by the labor union at Samsung Biologics (207940), accepting the company's argument and expanding the number of production processes that must continue operating normally during a walkout to nine from three.
The first civil division of the Seoul High Court's Incheon branch, presided over by Chief Judge Kwon Soon-min, granted Samsung Biologics' injunction request on nine processes in an appeal of its petition to bar industrial action against the union, excluding them from the scope of the strike, according to legal sources on the 16th.
The lower court in April had restricted industrial action in only three processes: concentration and buffer exchange, bulk drug substance filling, and buffer preparation and supply, which is linked to the first two. The company appealed, arguing that raw materials and products could spoil if the remaining processes — including flask cultivation, bioreactor cultivation, harvest and chromatography — were halted. The appeals court raised the number of processes subject to the restriction to nine.
The appeals court also partly accepted the company's request for indirect enforcement, ordering the union to pay 20 million won ($13,900) for each violation of the ruling. It excluded from the ban work on cell lines thawed after the start of the industrial action.
On the nine processes, the court ruled that the union "must not obstruct the performance of work with the same personnel, operating hours, operating scale and duty of care as in normal times, nor cause its members to engage in such obstruction."
In a statement the same day, Samsung Biologics said the court had determined that the entire production process constitutes safety work aimed at preventing the spoilage or decay of raw materials and products, and that operations therefore must be carried out normally, as in ordinary times, even during a period of industrial action.
The union plans to pursue procedures to challenge the court's decision while reviewing its plan for a second general strike, which had been set to run for three weeks from the 26th.