AO Arena and Bridgewater Hall operator made almost 1,000 people redundant in Covid pandemic

manchestereveningnews.co.uk:

The group that operates Manchester's AO Arena and Bridgewater Hall made almost 1,000 people redundant during the Covid-19 pandemic and lost over £8m, it has been revealed.

SMG Europe Holdings, which trades under the ASM Global brand, said it "had to made a number of redundancies to help arrest the ongoing level of cost in the business". The Manchester-headquartered group employed 2,111 members of staff in 2019, a figure that reduced to 1,668 in 2020 and again to 1,120 in 2021, according to new documents seen by the Manchester Evening News.

The company said the furlough scheme was a "major lifeline" for the business and had reduced the number of redundancies it made. The group received £7.4m from the government in furlough payments in 2020 and £2m in 2021.

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The group operates venues such as Wolverhampton Civic Halls, Bonus Arena in Hull, First Direct Arena in Leeds, OVO Hydro in Glasgow, P&J Live in Aberdeen and Utilita Arena in Newcastle. Its portfolio also includes York Barbican and Playhouse Whitley Bay.

SMG is also working on the development of the Becketwell Venue in Derby, a new 3,500-capacity music, entertainment, conference and events space, as well as Gateshead Quays Conference & Exhibition Centre and Sage Arena in Gateshead.

It launched the first phase of a major redevelopment of Manchester's AO Arena in December 2021 which is being completed over several phases between 2022 and 2023.

The employment figures have been revealed in newly-filed documents with Companies House which also show the group's turnover totalled £45.7m in 2021, while it made a pre-tax loss of £8.2m. Those figures compare to a turnover of £19.8m in 2020 and £90.3m in