WILMINGTON, DE - DuPont Chief Executive Ed Breen delivered some heavy news to employees in a company-wide memo, announcing that DuPont Co., who recently finalized merger plans with Dow Chemical, is cutting 1,700 Delaware jobs, about 28 percent of its workforce in the area.

“Especially given that we are in the middle of the holidays, we would have preferred to wait until individual notifications were complete before reporting the full local impact,” Breen wrote in the memo, according to Delaware Online. “… I wanted you to hear the difficult news – directly from me.”

While many were notified of their being cut earlier this month, several hundred of those that will be laid off will be notified in January to ensure the layoffs are complete during the first part of 2016. According to the report, this marks one of the largest mass layoffs to hit Delaware in recent history.

This move comes just a couple of months after the company announced that it will be laying off 5,000 employees nationwide in order to cut its spending by $1.6 billion.

DuPont officials wouldn’t comment on particulars, only that there are no plans to shutter any of the company’s facilities in the state at this time. Those consist of DuPont’s headquarters, employing about 3,000 workers, an experimental station employing about 2,500, and a research center with about 600 workers.

Breen stated that DuPont is required to detail the layoffs in a state filing due today, and so preferred to announce the full scope of the decision to the company himself.

Those that will be laid off will reportedly receive a severance package, officials stated, as well as placement services and training allowances based on how many years of service they have with DuPont.

DuPont Co.