With Unit Sold, Will Rockwell Keep Its Base?

It has been nearly six weeks since Rockwell International Corp. first announced its plans to spin off its struggling semiconductor unit. And one question has local industry watchers buzzing: Will Rockwell’s corporate offices stay in California?

After all, it was less than a year ago when staffers left their aerospace past in Seal Beach and stepped into the company’s gleaming new offices in Costa Mesa--five floors of smoked glass and stainless steel at the Plaza Tower.

“No way we’ll stay,” said one company staffer who requested anonymity. “Once semiconductor’s gone, the strong local tie is gone. Besides, look who’s in charge.”

Don H. Davis, the company’s chairman and chief executive, has been with the company for more than a decade. But his roots are in the slower-paced arena of factory automation--not the nail-biting, volatile market of semiconductors.

Davis spent most of his career at Allen-Bradley Co. in Milwaukee, an automation company he joined in 1963 as an engineering sales trainee. Rockwell bought it in 1985, and named Davis president of its automation division.

The company has remained mum about its plans, and executives decline to discuss the matter. But in the past, when the company shed other divisions, Rockwell executives firmly declared that its headquarters would remain in Southern California.

Part of the reason, say analysts, was that former CEO Donald R. Beall believed passionately in staying local while thinking global. He also was instrumental in starting the Orange County Business Council, and has been active in other business groups and political organizations.

Another key issue is whether the company’s high-tech professionals are willing to leave California for the Midwest. If Rockwell does relocate its corporate facilities, say insiders, executives could be heading off to Milwaukee or Cleveland, where the company has large manufacturing operations. And businesses would be clamoring for Rockwell’s current executive office space, said Mike Dorsey, a senior vice president with the commercial real estate firm Grubb & Ellis.

“It’s a very hot market right now, with only about a 6% vacancy rate for premium space in that area,” Dorsey said. “If they want to leave, they should have no problem getting [the offices] leased.”

P.J. Huffstutter covers high technology for The Times. She can be reached at (714) 966-7830 and at p.j.huffstutter@latimes.com.