600 jobs set to go
SIX hundred workers at a North electronics plant will lose their jobs in the New Year, it has been announced.
Microchip giant Atmel delivered a massive blow to the region’s economy by confirming it has found a buyer for its factory next to the Silverlink retail park in North Tyneside.
The firm, which took over the former Siemens plant in 2000 after receiving £27.8m of public money, will sell the site to Highbridge Business Park, the developers of the nearby Cobalt Business Park.
And Atmel has also agreed to sell off the factory’s water fabrication equipment to rivals Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Ltd (TSMC).
In total the deal is worth $124m (£60.6m) in cash to Atmel, which announced in December last year it wanted to sell up.
Bosses say they expect manufacturing to continue into the New Year, when production is then expected to be transferred to its other operations in America and France.
The site’s previous owner, Siemens, pulled out of the site in 1998 just 18 months after opening, leaving 2,400 redundancies in its wake.
Atmel received a Regional Selective Assistance (RSA) grant of £27.8m to set up, and initially said it wanted to employ 1,300 people in North Tyneside.
After the sale was announced 10 months ago, the DTI said it would look very closely at the terms of the grant, and whether it could be transferred to a new owner.
