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Politics : Formerly About Applied Materials -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Proud_Infidel who wrote (45215)	4/6/2001 10:39:31 PM
From: Proud_Infidel	Respond to of 70976

NEC Corp. says to cut 700 jobs at U.S. chip plant (UPDATE: adds details) SAN FRANCISCO, April 6 (Reuters) - Japan electronics giant NEC Corp. said Friday that it was cutting 700 jobs at a U.S. microchip plant as a result of the severe downturn in demand for semiconductors. NEC has laid off 100 employees and will dismiss another 600 in the next 45-60 days as it decreases production at a semiconductor fabrication plant in Roseville, California. That represents about 30 percent of the workforce at Santa Clara, Calif.-based NEC Electronics, Inc., the U.S. semiconductor arm of the Japanese manufacturer. NEC's decision follow warnings and job cuts by top microchip and network parts makers like Intel Corp.(NasdaqNM:INTC - news) and Cisco Systems Inc. (NasdaqNM:CSCO - news), which have been rocked by the weakening U.S. economy. ``Demand is so poor at the moment that we have to reduce production,'' said Mark Pearce, a spokesman for NEC Electronics. Pearce said the company, despite its Japanese heritage as a firm that did not lay off workers, decided to make the job cuts after it became clear that other cost-cutting had not offset the steep decline in semiconductor sales over the past few months. ``This is like the final straw. NEC is not a company that lays people off lightly,'' he said. NEC Electronics had about 2,400 people prior to the new layoffs and had cut 200 jobs at its Santa Clara, Calif. headquarters early this year. NEC said it will shift the Roseville plant away from DRAM memory chips and toward higher-margin products, such as logic devices and other products for the communications market. Pearce said the company was still building an advanced assembly line at the plant.