SUPERIOR'S TENNESSEE PLANT CLOSING WHEEL MAKER TO CUT 5,000 JOBS.Byline: GREGORY J. WILCOX Wilcox may refer to: Place names in the United States
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VAN NUYS -- In response to a shrinking market, wheel maker Superior Industries International Inc. said Friday Friday: see Sabbath; week. Friday young Indian rescued by Crusoe and kept as servant and companion. [Br. Lit.: Robinson Crusoe] See : Servant that it will close its plant in Tennessee Tennessee, state, United States Tennessee (tĕn`əsē', tĕn'əsē`), state in the south-central United States. and cut 500 jobs. The shutdown shut·down n. A cessation of operations or activity, as at a factory. shutdown Noun the closing of a factory, shop, or other business Verb shut down of the Johnson City Johnson City. 1 Village (1990 pop. 16,890), Broome co., S N.Y., in a tricity area including Endicott and Binghamton; inc. 1892. It has been noted for its Endicott-Johnson shoes. , Tenn., manufacturing facility should be completed in the 2007 first quarter, the company said. That will leave Van Nuys-based Superior with nine manufacturing sites in the United States United States, officially United States of America, republic (2005 est. pop. 295,734,000), 3,539,227 sq mi (9,166,598 sq km), North America. The United States is the world's third largest country in population and the fourth largest country in area. , Mexico and Europe. Word that Superior is shuttering the Johnson City plant came the same day that one of its big customers, Ford Motor Co., said it will slash 10,000 white-collar positions. And that followed an earlier announcement by Ford that 75,000 hourly wage jobs will be eliminated. ``I don't see it turning around any time soon,'' R. Jeffery Ornstein, Superior's vice president and chief financial officer, said of the domestic industry woes. ``We hope this will make it more positive for the remaining facilities.'' Earlier this year Superior cut 375 jobs, or 41 percent of its Van Nuys work force and said it was selling its suspension components business. ``This is the latest step in our program to rationalize ra·tion·al·ize v. 1. To make rational. 2. To devise self-satisfying but false or inconsistent reasons for one's behavior, especially as an unconscious defense mechanism through which irrational acts or feelings are made to appear our production capacity to more effectively balance plant utilization and costs against our customers' changing requirements for pricing, wheel size, design, scheduling and volume,'' Superior President and Chief Executive Officer Steven Borick said in a statement. The company noted that the Big 3 automakers' announcements of sweeping production cuts, particularly in Superior's important light trucks and SUV platforms, have reduced product In model theory, a branch of mathematical logic, the reduced product is a construction that generalizes both direct product and ultraproduct. demand at least near term. Employees in Johnson City were informed of the shutdown on Friday as were city officials. ``Superior had been a good employer here for nearly 20 years,'' said Mayor Steve Darden. ``It will be very difficult to replace those jobs with comparable ones. Certainly it won't occur overnight.'' Superior was among six companies -- and the biggest -- that had operations in the city of 55,000 to support the state's automotive manufacturing sector. Closing the plant will cost Superior about $1 million. As of Aug. 31, the company valued these manufacturing assets at $18 million. Analyst Brett D. Hoselton at KeyBanc Capital Mkts/McDonald said that Superior's announcement was not surprising because Superior is being challenged on two fronts. Not only are the lead customers loosing market share and cutting production but Superior faces increased competition, especially from China. ``I think there is a high probability of further capacity reductions at Superior in the U.S. because of those two factors,'' Hoselton said. greg.wilcox@dailynews.com (818) 713-3743 |
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