By Christopher Alessi in Frankfurt and Jacob Bunge in Chicago 

Bayer AG will maintain Monsanto Co.'s entire U.S. workforce after the German chemicals giant's planned $57 billion acquisition of the U.S. agrochemical group, a spokesman for President-elect Donald Trump said Tuesday.

According to Trump transition team spokesman Sean Spicer, Bayer Chief Executive Werner Baumann pledged in a recent meeting with Mr. Trump to keep 100% of Monsanto's more than 9,000 U.S. jobs in the country and to create at least 3,000 new U.S. high-tech jobs. Mr. Baumann also committed to spending $8 billion on new research and development plans, Mr. Spicer said on a call with reporters.

"The reason for this commitment and expansion is because of the president-elect's focus on creating a better business climate here in the United States," Mr. Spicer added, noting that Monsanto's headquarters would remain in St. Louis.

In a joint statement that followed the Trump team's remarks, Bayer and Monsanto said the merger would create "several thousand" new high-tech positions in the U.S., but they declined to comment on concrete job numbers.

Bayer's pledge makes it the latest major company to make commitments on U.S. jobs, investment or operations following Mr. Trump's November election after a campaign that emphasized job creation and domestic business expansion. Mr. Trump vowed to bring back manufacturing positions to the U.S., and since his election has castigated companies for shifting operations abroad while praising others for domestic expansion plans.

General Motors Co. on Tuesday confirmed a plan to invest a further $1 billion in its U.S. manufacturing operations, while Hyundai Motor Co. outlined a new $3.1 billion investment in U.S. manufacturing plants. Also on Tuesday, Wal-Mart Stores Inc. touted its plans to add about 10,000 U.S. jobs this year. Last week, Amazon.com Inc. outlined plans for an additional 100,000 full-time U.S. jobs.

Bayer's Mr. Baumann and Monsanto Chief Executive Hugh Grant met with the president-elect last week in New York to make the case for Bayer's planned takeover of the U.S. seed maker amid concerns over whether such a deal could hurt U.S. jobs and competitiveness. Some farmers and state agricultural officials on Mr. Trump's agricultural advisory committee, created last year to advise Mr. Trump's campaign on farm policy matters, have called on Mr. Trump to block tie-ups between some of the agricultural industry's biggest players, over concerns that competition will slacken and prices for seeds and crop sprays will rise.

While Bayer has said that buying Monsanto isn't based on cutting costs from the combined businesses, the German company in September targeted about $1.5 billion in cost savings from the deal. On a September conference call with employees, Mr. Baumann acknowledged that some layoffs could be inevitable due to overlapping jobs.

The companies also said Tuesday that they expect to spend roughly $16 billion for R&D in agriculture over the next six years, with at least half of that investment in the U.S. That works out to a total of about $2.7 billion a year. Monsanto spent slightly more than $1.5 billion on research and development efforts in each of the past two years, while Bayer spent about $1 billion in agricultural R&D in 2014 and $1.17 billion in 2015.

The German firm and Monsanto agreed to create an agricultural powerhouse in September, ending the independence of one of the U.S.'s most successful and controversial corporations.

"The United States is a global leader in agriculture, and the combination of Bayer-Monsanto will underscore that role and ensure the United States retains a pre-eminent position as the anchor of the industry," the companies said in the statement.

Bayer plans to fuse its prowess in pesticides -- it ranks among the world's largest suppliers -- with Monsanto's capabilities in seed genetics and biotechnology, which have allowed it to develop corn, soybeans, cotton and other crops that can survive weed-killing sprays and make natural toxins to repel bugs. The merged company would be the world's No. 1 supplier by sales of both seeds and pesticides.

The deal, the latest in a wave of consolidation in the industry, still faces regulatory hurdles in the U.S. and Europe. It would shift Bayer's business focus away from its lucrative pharmaceuticals division and focus it more squarely on agriculture.

--Damian Paletta contributed to this article.

Write to Christopher Alessi at christopher.alessi@wsj.com and Jacob Bunge at jacob.bunge@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

January 17, 2017 14:10 ET (19:10 GMT)

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