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North Las Vegas solar panel plant lays off 200 workers
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LAS VEGAS REVIEW-JOURNAL
Updated: Jan. 26, 2012 | 9:23 a.m.
One month after losing its chief executive officer in a fatal plane crash, Amonix is laying off about 200 people from its solar panel manufacturing plant in North Las Vegas, a company spokeswoman confirmed late Wednesday.
"We are retooling to redeploy our next generation utility-scale CPV (concentrated photovoltaic) solar power system," Kelly Rice said in an e-mail. "During this time, we will ramp down our facility to about 100 jobs, and will ramp back up based on the manufacturing build plan in second half of 2012."
Seal Beach, Calif.-based Amonix announced in 2010 it would hire about 300 workers after signing a five-year lease for 214,000 square feet in the Golden Triangle industrial park, near Pecos and Craig roads.
Most of the jobs were on the factory floor, from machine operators to engineers. Other positions included office, accounting and supply, with pay ranging from $12 to $14 an hour for manufacturing jobs, and from $50,000 to $100,000 annually for managers.
The company's North Las Vegas plant is a joint venture with Singapore's Flextronics Industrial. Amonix founder and chairman Vahan Garboushian had estimated capital investment of $15 million in the plant, including equipment, construction and tenant improvements.
Amonix received $5.9 million in federal funding from the Recovery Act's Advanced Energy Manufacturing Tax Credit to build the plant, which opened to much fanfare in May with a ribbon-cutting attended by Nevada Gov. Brian Sandoval.
It was supposed to generate an overall economic impact of $608 million, including $118 million in annual payroll, $10 million in local tax revenue and $2.5 million in state tax revenue, according to the Nevada Development Authority.
Established in 1989, Amonix raised $129 million in private funding from Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield and Byers, and $25 million from Goldman Sachs and MissionPoint Capital. It also received a $15.6 million grant from the Department of Energy Solar American Initiative.
In December, Amonix Chief Executive Officer Brian Robertson died in a plane crash in Pennsylvania.
Contact reporter Hubble Smith at hsmith@reviewjournal.com or 702-383-0491.
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Another boondoggle.
more change you can belive in ???
Of the 200 that were laid off, 95% were temp workers. Temp is short for temporary......make sense now?
Where is Mayor Buck & Sandoval for a photo op for this press release?
Sure Jen.LV. And while we are at it let's quit eating fish and crab because people die in that career too. Also lumber jacks, farmers, ranchers, construction workers, steel mill workers, etc., etc., etc., and all the other jobs that have risk to them to provide the goods for a demanding world market. It must be nice being so simple minded.
Did Obama stop by for a quick visit here before going to the UPS facility?
Let's blow up some more mountains and kill more miners while polluting the air for more coal!! YEHAAWWW.. That sounds like a good plan!!!
Pres. Obama is just in time to show up for his campaign kick back money from Amonix. How convenient.
ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha...green jobs...ha ha ha ha
Wow, yet all of you basically applaud when NV Energy lays off people...