Tech sector workers wonder where jobs will be next year.

It's been a while since Long Nguyen had a job--eight months to be exact.

Nguyen, 28, worked at Powerwave Technologies Inc. for four years as a technician at the company's massive Santa Ana plant.

But last year Powerwave said it planned to move production of its wireless amplifiers to cheaper plants in Asia--near Nguyen's native Vietnam, from which he and his family emigrated in 1996.

"The economy in the U.S. was so bad, I wasn't surprised (about the move)," Nguyen said.

Powerwave cut more than half its 1,200 workers in July.

Nguyen stays with his mother, who is unemployed, and his father, who sews clothes in an Anaheim apparel plant. They live in a small apartment in Stanton on his father's income and what's left of his Powerwave severance.

"At first it was hard getting laid off," said Nguyen, who is attending a technology trade school--paid for by Powerwave as part of the severance package. "I hope to have a job when I get out."

Overseas activity

Nguyen is one of the 10,900 people, or 21 percent, who lost manufacturing jobs at Orange County technology companies between January 2001 and January 2004, according to the California Employment Development Department. Los Angeles tech companies lost 11,800 manufacturing jobs during the same period, an almost 17 percent drop.

Along with Powerwave, other tech companies have moved manufacturing facilities overseas to take advantage of cheaper labor.

Irvine-based Microsemi Corp. said last fall that it was closing its Santa Ana chip-making plant. The shuttering comes on top of eight other plant closings for the company in the past three years. About 285 Microsemi workers in Santa Ana are losing their jobs.

Milbank Manufacturing Co., a maker of circuit breakers and other electrical gear, closed its 175-person Anaheim plant last October. Milbank cited California's high cost of doing business in moving operations back to its home base in Kansas City, Mo.

As companies shift manufacturing jobs overseas or to cheaper U.S. locations, it's not clear what will happen to the workers--largely foreign-born Americans--who had filled the jobs.

While companies don't disclose the ethnic makeup of their workforce, anecdotal evidence and information gleaned in interviews reveals Southern California's manufacturing sector employs a diverse group.

Said one former line manager at Powerwave, who didn't want to be named: "There were many from Asia and from Mexico. Some took side jobs doing nails. Some of them want to move back to Asia. It's hard."

Contract manufacturers have driven the job losses, said Scott Penin, president of the Surface Mount Technology Association's Los Angeles and Orange County chapter.

"The tier one--the Solectrons and the Celesticas--there's not enough business to support them here, so they're moving most of their stuff over to China," said Penin, who also is chief executive of Santa Ana-based circuit board maker Paradigm Manufacturing LLC.

High-end jobs remain

Some economists see light at the end of the tunnel. The EDD projects that Orange County technology manufacturing jobs are expected to grow about 12 percent from 2001 through 2008.

Why the rosy forecast?

While so-called low-end jobs assembling and packaging circuit boards might be shifting to places where they can be done cheaper, higher-end jobs appear to be staying here. Quick-turnaround board makers, for have started to boom as their customers--computer makers and other original equipment makers--see a recovery.

One company--Anaheim's DDi Corp.--is among the early beneficiaries of the tech turnaround.

As demand for computers, networking gear and other products picks up, companies are turning to DDi and other rapid-fire electronics makers to meet demand, rather than sign longterm deals for circuit boards. Another circuit board maker, Santa Ana's TTM Technologies Inc., also has seen its business surge.

In the near-term, overall tech manufacturing won't see job gains. In fact, Chapman University expects tech manufacturing job losses tO continue through the end of the year, though the annual loss is expected to be a slim 0.8 percent. New jobs will be added in 2005, according to Chapman's forecast.

The projections don't cheer Judy Chen-Lee.

Lee runs the Santa Ana Work Center, an agency that helps displaced workers find a job in partnership with the city of Santa Ana and the EDD.

Less than three miles from Powerwave's Santa Ana headquarters, the center has seen many former assembly workers and line managers come looking for help. Laid-off workers hoping to find a new job that pays a high salary are in for a surprise.

"After 10 years working at an assembly job, it's very difficult to replace those kind of wages," said Chen-Lee.

Tech manufacturing jobs typically pay $15 to $16 an hour, she said. While many former tech manufacturing workers have skills they learned on the job, most of them are not useful to office or service jobs opening up.

"They didn't need to have computer literacy, but now they need to have some familiarity with the computer," Chen-Lee said. "They had supervisors who were able to communicate in their native language. Now they need an acceptable level of communication."