ON Semi to close fabs, lay off 400

The front-end fabs to be closed total 120,000-square feet of space and produce digital logic, bipolar analog, planar MOSFETs, and BCD analog devices.

By Suzanne Deffree, Managing Editor, News -- Electronic News, 5/14/2008

ON Semiconductor has announced plans to close its two wafer manufacturing facilities located in Piestany, Slovakia, transferring the production lines to other company-owned facilities and laying off approximately 400 employees in the next 12 to 18 months.

The move comes two months after ON Semi confirmed plans to cut about 200 global employees and close a Pocatello, Idaho, fab as it merged in AMI Semiconductor (AMIS) following its $915 million acquisition.  
 
“This closure is not a reflection on the hard work and dedication of our employees in Piestany,” said Keith Jackson, ON Semi’s president and CEO, in a statement. “This closure is part of our ongoing strategy to create operational efficiencies and add value for both our customers and shareholders. By migrating manufacturing operations away from lower volume and smaller scale manufacturing facilities to more advanced, larger scale, and larger volume fabs, we believe we can increase our production efficiencies and enhance our overall product reliability for all our customers.” 
 
The closing of the two fabs at the Piestany site (pictured right) will result in approximately 400 manufacturing-related jobs cuts beginning in May 2009, the Phoenix-based company said. 

According to the company, wafer production at the Piestany fabs accounts for less than 2% of the total number of units manufactured by ON Semi and AMIS. The front-end fabs to be closed total 120,000-square feet of space and produce digital logic, bipolar analog, planar MOSFETs, and BCD analog devices.

On Semi’s non-manufacturing back-end business operations will remain in Piestany. The back-end operations employ approximately 200 people and include the company’s customer service centers for the Americas and Europe, which will remain in place unchanged, the company said. ON Semi’s university-based design center located in Bratislava, Slovakia, will remain operating, the company added.
 
ON Semi is targeting a Q4 2009 close date for the fabs.