Hard times continue at Agere; more job cuts could be coming (400 jobs)

[UpInArms]

http://www.mcall.com/business/local/all-ageresep22,0,1672974.story?coll=all-businesslocal-hed

Agere Systems is expected to announce as early as Thursday that it will cut at least 20 percent of its work force. Sources say the chipmaker's Lehigh Valley operations could be particularly hard hit.

<snip>

If the company cuts 20 percent of its 6,600 employees, more than 1,300 Agere workers worldwide could be without work Thursday. A 20 percent reduction in the company's 2,200 local employees would mean more than 400 people in the Lehigh Valley would be jobless.

<snip>

These would be the first significant job cuts since June 2003 when Agere closed its Union Boulevard chip factory in Allentown, the site in 1951 of the first commercial production line of transistors. Once the crown jewel of the Lehigh Valley's tech economy, Agere had one of the top 10 initial public offerings at the time it separated from Lucent Technologies in a two-step process beginning in 2001.

<snip>

Over the years, Agere's employment has dwindled. In 2000 as it prepared to spin off from Lucent, Agere employed about 18,000 people worldwide and 9,000 in the Lehigh Valley and Reading areas. The company announced a series of large layoffs in 2001 and 2002 that shrank Agere's work force by about two-thirds.

<snip>

Some Agere employees say there aren't many people left to cut locally. In the past two years, the company closed plants in Allentown and near Reading, sold its fiber-optic components business and laid off thousands of workers.

...more...

[mbperrin]

1. Woo-hoo! Look at that * job machine go!!!

There go some more jobs!!