Speedfam is hiring... :-)
Friday January 29, 1:21 PM (EST)
Arizona Absorbs Bumps In The EE Jobs Market
Jan 29, 1999 (Tech Web - CMP via COMTEX) -- We may indeed be headed toward a virtual world, but until then, one can never overestimate the value of a good setting. And as settings go, few are better than Arizona. With desert, skiing, and year-round summer, it's basically California without the beach -- but with more than a few of the biggest engineering employers in the world.
Most of the 85,000 people who relocated to the 48th state last year came in search of jobs. While Arizona doesn't have a grasp on how many of those were engineering posts, Carl True of the Greater Phoenix Chamber of Commerce said 46 percent of all manufacturing jobs in the state are in high technology. That's roughly three times the average for the rest of the nation, said True, director of business retention and expansion for the chamber.
Part of the draw is undoubtedly Arizona's rugged natural beauty. Phoenix, with the Grand Canyon two-and-a-half hours away, excellent slopes even closer, and eternal golf, is the ideal outdoorsy city, said True. While smaller cities such as Mesa and Tucson have their share of technology employers -- Raytheon in the former and Boeing in the latter-- Phoenix is where most of the action is.
Big-name companies such as Motorola, Intel, Boeing, and AlliedSignal have been fixtures for some time in and around the city. Avnet, the world's second-largest distributor of electronic components, relocated its headquarters here last year. Microchip Technology, STMicroelectronics, and Burr-Brown all have their headquarters or major units in the state.
To meet the needs of these companies, a growing number of semiconductor-equipment manufacturers have set up shop, including SpeedFam International in Chandler. And these companies are hiring. SpeedFam, for example, said it's looking for a range of engineers, including experienced EEs for designing machine electrical controls, panel boards, process instrumentation, and applications for power distribution. It also has posts for mechanical and process engineers.
"There's a huge market for wafers here," said Jack Haen-ichen, deputy director of the state's Department of Commerce. That translates into a sizable demand for skilled labor in the field.
The state's unemployment rate flutters between 2 and 3 percent, Haenichen said. And when downturns in the semiconductor industry forced a round of layoffs last year, he said the muscular economy was able to absorb most of the out-of-workers.
Still, the Arizona economy has to adjust to a more cost-conscious semiconductor industry. Santa Clara, Calif.-based Intel, a major presence in Chandler, said it has scrapped plans to hire any new manufacturing workers for the facility. Rick Cole, an Intel staffing consultant, said the company will try to do more with less by streamlining manufacturing operations and improving the production
of its existing labor force.
Motorola and other chip makers face similar challenges, though the industry shows signs of a sustained recovery. Last year's layoffs at Motorola hurt consultants and manufacturing people more than full-time engineers in the area. But the retrenchment certainly put a damper on the go-go expansion that marked the Phoenix economy for most of the '90s.
Other technology sectors are picking up the slack, however. Cole said Intel's other main business, its computer-enhancement group, is in the hunt for new employees. These include ASIC designers, device-driver developers, software engineers, and CAD engineers. The company values experience, he said, but does hire people straight from college, usually EEs, computer-science graduates, and MBAs. |
