APRIL 28, 2009
Corning Hires Laid-Off Staff Amid Signs of Recovery
By SARA SILVER
WSJ
Stronger-than-expected demand for glass used in making flat-screen televisions helped Corning Inc. eke out a profit in the first quarter, as the company starts to reignite some of its manufacturing capabilities and bring back laid off workers. The specialty glass maker, which just three months ago announced it would lay off 13%, or 3,500, of its employees, said Monday it will bring back idled capacity in some of its glass factories in response to rising global demand for liquid-crystal displays. The company in recent months has also rehired some workers making optical fiber for telecom carriers.
The news comes as a rare bright spot for the technology industry, which has been ravaged by layoffs and cost-cutting during the global downturn. Chip giant Intel Corp. signaled earlier this month that the computer industry may have bottomed out in the first quarter. But the signs aren't all rosy, made evident by Microsoft Corp. posting its first-ever revenue decline last week.
About 100 Corning workers have been rehired at two plants in North Carolina after Corning received contracts for optical fiber from Chinese telecom carriers building high-speed wireless broadband networks. At the plant in Wilmington, N.C., 86 workers laid off last year have been brought back, according to Wilhelmenia Hardy, president of the United Steelworkers union at the plant. "These people are very grateful to be back to work," she said.
Corning, which posted a 39% plunge in sales for the quarter from a year earlier, said it expected more cuts in the division making emissions-control devices for the ailing auto and truck industries and warned it could see another broad restructuring if demand doesn't pick up by the second half of the year. Most of the Corning workers who lost their jobs remain laid off and will be brought back only as the company finds new contracts in individual businesses, according to spokesman Daniel F. Collins.
To do significant rehiring throughout the company, Corning would need to exceed the $5 billion in sales it forecast for the current year, the spokesman said. In 2008, the company had sales of $5.9 billion. While the company, based in Corning, N.Y., makes products ranging from telescope mirrors to technology designed to speed the discovery of new drugs, it derives more than 90% of its profit from its LCD business. Global sales of LCD TVs are expected to increase 18% this year, according to data from the market-research firm NPD.
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Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page B1
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124083072037758909.html (subscription)
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