5 Gunmen Rob Computer Chip Company

Five armed men burst into a computer materials company Tuesday night, bound and gagged several employees and stole more than $10,000 worth of memory chips.

No one was seriously injured in the 6:46 p.m. takeover robbery at Anacapa Micro Products Inc., 2259 Portola Road.

Peter Ullberg, a company executive, said the men screamed and pointed guns at the employees during the 30-minute ordeal.

“It was all young guys in their 20s,” said Ullberg, who was one of those gagged. “They knew what they wanted. They took the memory that was most valuable.”

Ventura police were searching for five Asian males in their 20s. The men, who wore surgical masks during the robbery, fled in a gray Toyota van and possibly one other vehicle.

The robbers wore jeans and T-shirts and spoke English, according to Ullberg, who added that all five carried either 9-millimeter or .45-caliber handguns.

Ullberg said an employee was emptying garbage outside the building when one of the men approached with a pistol. The man demanded entry into the building where up to eight employees were working in several offices.

“We were in different rooms and I ran out when I heard screaming,” Ullberg said. “They were screaming for us to get our hands up.”

The employees were taken to an adjoining main warehouse where their mouths, hands and ankles were bound with duct tape.

The men then forced the company’s owner to go to his office and retrieve a specific set of keys used to unlock cages in the warehouse where the most valuable memory chips were stored, Ullberg said.

The men unlocked the cages and loaded specific computer materials into the rear of the van, Ullberg said. Ullberg would not specify the the exact dollar loss, except to say it was more than $10,000.

Shortly after the robbers fled, Ullberg said, the employees freed themselves and called authorities.

Police Lt. Brad Talbot said it was too soon to determine whether the holdup was related to others that have occurred in Southern California in the past three years.

Last June, 17 members or associates of an Asian gang were indicted in federal court in connection with two major takeover-style robberies, including the nation’s largest heist of computer chips when $10 million in chips and other products were stolen from Centon Electronics Inc. in Irvine.