GlobalFoundries Laying Off 148 Workers in Essex Junction 

Source: Seven Days

Semiconductor giant GlobalFoundries has informed Vermont that it is laying off 148 people in the state amid a corporate-wide downsizing.

The cuts, detailed in a recent state filing, represent about 7 percent of the 2,000 people employed at the chipmaker’s Essex Junction plant. The company began notifying impacted employees last week, according to VTDigger.org, which first reported the news. 

The disclosure comes after the company announced that it was cutting roughly 800 people from its 14,000-person global workforce in an effort to slash operating costs by about $200 million. The announcement came on the same day that leaders of the $35 billion company told investors that GlobalFoundries had raked in $2 billion in revenue in the third quarter of this year — a 22 percent increase over the same period last year.

But they said they were bracing for an economic slowdown amid rising interest rates and falling demand for its products. They specifically cited a desire to cut back on chips made on the 200-millimeter wafers that GlobalFoundries only produces in Singapore and Essex Junction.