Circuit Board Plant to Close in Costa Mesa

Fela Precision, a Swiss-owned manufacturer of electronic circuit boards, said Friday that it will close its manufacturing plant here in September and lay off 103 employees.

Sam Hughes, president of the Fela Precision division, said the closing is the result of several factors, the most important of which was a conflict between two of the Swiss parent firm’s operations.

Fela Precision manufactures printed circuit boards, Hughes said, and a sister division, Fela Tec, sells the Swiss parent company’s machinery that is used to make the boards. Both divisions are owned by Fela Electronics Group of Thundorf, Switzerland.

“We were selling equipment to the same people we competed with in making boards,” he said. “And we were starting to lose equipment customers because of that conflict.”

Two other factors in the closure, he said, were stiff competition in the circuit board market and the high cost of operating a manufacturing plant in Orange County.

Fela Precision will close Sept. 7, about 18 months after the company started its U.S. operations with the purchase of Koboway Circuits in Costa Mesa.