Hoechst Celanese to Close Behring Unit; About 180 to Lose Jobs

Hoechst Celanese Corp. will close its Behring Diagnostics division in Torrey Pines by the end of this year, putting at least 180 local workers out of jobs, Hoechst officials said Tuesday.

The decision to close the plant, which was announced to employees last week, was prompted by Behring’s “consistent losses over a 10-year period,” Hoechst Celanese Vice President Hubert Huckel said Tuesday. Acquired by Hoechst Celanese in 1977 when it was known as Calbiochem Corp., Behring posted sales of $25 million in 1986, he said.

The closure affects 200 Behring workers based in San Diego and 60 Behring salespersons stationed elsewhere, Huckel said. Only about 20 of the San Diego employees will be offered transfers to Behring Diagnostics’ relocated offices at Hoechst Celanese’s headquarters in Bridgewater, N.J., Huckel said. An undetermined number of sales persons will also be asked to stay on.

Layoffs will be phased in over several months, with the plant closing down completely by the end of this year, Hoechst Celanese said.

One Behring employee contacted at the plant on Tuesday, who asked not to be identified, said the announcement came as no surprise to him. “We haven’t been doing too well for some time,” he said.

Huckel said the plant closing “doesn’t deserve all that much attention” because Behring is a small operation in relation to Hoechst Celanese’s overall business. Hoechst Celanese employs 25,000 and posted sales of $4.6 billion in 1986. Its parent company, Hoechst AG of Frankfurt, West Germany, had 1986 worldwide sales of $17 billion.

The Behring plant, a 117,000-square-foot building on a 16.1-acre site in Torrey Pines, will soon be put up for sale, Huckel said. Kraig Kristofferson, a commercial real estate broker with Coldwell Banker in San Diego, said the land and building together could be worth $22 million.