6 Tektronix Workers To Be Laid Off
BEAVERTON, Ore. - Tektronix Inc. will lay off 600 employees by late May because an expected increase in sales has not materialized.
Most of the layoffs will occur in Washington County in the Test and Measurement Group, Doug Babb, spokesman for the Beaverton-based electronics company, announced yesterday.
The Test and Management Group manufactures various products, including Tektronix's original product line, oscilloscopes.
The group typically accounts for more than half of Tektronix's sales, but its volume recently has declined faster than the company's other lines of business.
Other employee cuts will occur in Tektronix operations that handle U.S. and international distribution channels.
Babb said that some employees to be laid off were told the news before yesterday morning's public announcement but that others had not yet been chosen. As required by the federal plant-closure law, each employee involved will get 60 days' layoff notice and the opportunity to apply for posted vacancies elsewhere in the company, Babb said.
``We expected our new product flow would provide us with enough growth to begin to show earnings improvement,'' said David Friedley, Tektronix's president.
After expenses for the cuts, plus taxes and other costs, are subtracted, the Beaverton-based company probably will post a loss for the quarter ending March 3, company officials said.
Friedley attributed the company's problems partly to weak demand in the defense, computer and semiconductor industries.
``Our product line and market positions remain strong,'' he said, ``but we must get our expenses into line with our revenue.''
The 44-year-old company manufactures electronic testing and measuring gear, television control room equipment, computer monitors and printers, and sophisticated computers known as workstations.
The job cuts will continue a series of layoffs and job eliminations that have occurred at Tektronix since the early 1980s, when it was Oregon's largest employer, with more than 24,000 workers worldwide. As of the last quarter ending Nov. 11, it had 15,136, of whom about 8,800 worked in the Portland-Vancouver, Wash., area.
About 100 were cut from Tektronix last summer, and 1,000 others were dropped between March and May 1988.
Tektronix also recently announced it would close its plant on the English Channel Island of Guernsey, laying off 200 there and consolidating the manufacturing in Holland.
Tektronix, whose sales have remained essentially flat since 1984, has flitted back and forth between profits and losses in recent quarters. In the quarter that ended Nov. 11, it made a penny-a-share profit.