TV Maker Thomson to Cut 1,500 Jobs

Thomson Consumer Electronics, the nation’s largest maker of televisions, said it will cut more than 1,500 jobs from two U.S. factories and move the work to Mexico, where labor is cheaper. With the factory closings, the company will effectively get out of the U.S. TV-assembly business. It will remain a maker of TV parts. Thomson, which makes RCA, GE and ProScan TV sets, plans to shut its Bloomington, Ind., plant, which employs 1,100 people. It also will cease production at its TV cabinet plant in Indianapolis, cutting 420 workers by April 1998. The company cited fierce U.S. competition that has driven down prices of color TV sets, reducing profit margins at time of lower-than-expected sales. Based in the Indianapolis suburb of Carmel, the company is a unit of France’s state-owned defense and electronics firm, Thomson.