Compaq cuts Houston jobs
The company lays off close to 1,000 manufacturing employees in its hometown of Houston this week as part of the plan to cut 17,000.
In June, Compaq said it would lay off 5,000 manufacturing employees and 17,000 in total.
Under the plan to streamline manufacturing, Compaq said it would cut approximately 1,000 manufacturing jobs in its Houston facility, 600 in a Marlboro, Massachusetts, manufacturing facility it acquired from Digital, and 3,400 internationally, according to the spokesman.
The cutbacks come as a result of the Digital acquisition, which greatly increased Compaq's headcount, as well as Compaq's ongoing effort to streamline its manufacturing operations. The employees affected come from the direct manufacturing line operations in Houston, a spokesman said.
The Compaq spokesperson would not confirm an exact number of the layoffs this week but said that it was larger than 500 and involved the bulk of the positions to be reduced in Houston. A limited number of layoffs had already occurred and only a small number in Houston have yet to be cut.
Although manufacturing employees so far have borne the brunt of Compaq's cost cutting, other departments will face limited cutbacks, the spokesperson said.