South Korean car giant Daewoo is to axe 187 jobs at its UK technical centre under plans to continue cutting costs.

Staff at the research and engineering plant at Lyons Farm - which employed 750 workers before the parent company went bankrupt - were told the grim news at a meeting today.

The cuts will take effect immediately and will reduce the workforce by 40 per cent, leaving 250 employees.

Daewoo is thought to be close to selling the Worthing centre but despite "ongoing efforts" to secure a sale, the company said today that a deal was not yet complete.

Managing director Jim Mason said: "As part of Daewoo Motors' undertaking to reduce overheads across its global operations, it is forced to issue redundancy notices to 187 staff in order to maintain ongoing operations at the centre while waiting for a sale to be concluded.

"We are disappointed that we are forced to say goodbye to so many loyal and committed members of our team."

He said the company was still some way from securing the sale of the centre.

Enhanced redundancy packages will be paid to the staff losing their jobs.

Sales and servicing of Daewoo cars are not affected by the cutback.

The news follows a year of strife for the car maker. Its problems started when Korea lurched into an economic slump and the company has been on the market for some time.

Last year it announced 113 job losses and at times ran out of money to pay workers' wages. A hoped-for deal with US car maker Ford came to nothing.

Last month we revealed that Tom Walkinshaw, boss of Formula One team TWR, was looking to buy the Worthing plant.

The Manufacturing Science and Finance union said it would seek urgent talks with the Department of Trade and Industry to try to find a diplomatic solution to continuing job losses.

General secretary Roger Lyons said: "The Worthing centre is far too valuable an asset to allow it to go down the drain."