Matsushita to End U.S. Chip Operations

Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., the world’s largest consumer electronics manufacturer, will close down its computer chip-making operations in the United States by year’s end. The move will affect about 340 employees at the Puyallup, Wash., factory of Matsushita Semiconductor Corp., an affiliate of Osaka, Japan-based Matsushita Electric Industrial. Matsushita sells products under the Panasonic, Quasar, National and Technics names. The decision to close the factory, which primarily made dynamic random access memory chips, followed similar moves to withdraw from U.S.-based chip production by Japanese rivals Hitachi Ltd. and Mitsubishi Electric Corp. All three electronics makers have been hit hard by a global glut in computer memory chips.