Lockheed company to leave Glendale

Robert Shaffer

GRAND CENTRAL -- A Glendale company that designs warning systems for

nuclear, chemical and biological weapons is leaving Glendale and taking

50 jobs with it.

Lockheed Martin Librascope, located on Sonora Avenue in the city’s

industrial district, will relocate to Manasses, Va., to be closer to

operations there. The Glendale facility reports directly to Lockheed

Martin Naval Electronics and Surveillance Systems in that city.

“Essentially, we’re consolidating operations,” said Lou Stefano, a

Lockheed Martin spokesperson. “It will allow us to improve efficiency and

reduce costs to be more competitive.”

Most employees have been given transfer opportunities, he said.

The Glendale facility designs several items for the Department of

Defense including MICAD, a lightweight device that suspects chemical

weapons in the air. The company also designs an air purifying system used

for military purposes.

The exodus will end the company’s presence in Glendale, which in the

past decade has been filled with buyouts and mergers.

Librascope is not the first company to scale down operations in

Glendale or leave altogether this month. Last week, Nestle announced

plans to cut 64 jobs in Glendale to cut costs and remain competitive.

Loral Space & Communications, a New York City-based satellite design

and manufacturing company, bought Librascope in 1991. Five years later,

Lockheed Martin Corp. purchased part of Loral for $9.1 billion.

Since late 1996, the Librascope facility has been scheduled to move to

Virginia as part of the integration of Loral into Lockheed Martin. It was

part of a larger plan to move or close eight facilities and cut 1,600

jobs in the U.S.

Lockheed Martin Corp., based in Bethesda, Md., is an advanced

technology company that employs 160,000 people in 457 cities in the U.S.

and 55 other countries. More than half of its business is with the

Department of Defense.

Glendale is not the only city affected by the company’s consolidation

plans. The 1996 plans also called for abandoning facilities in several

American and Canadian cities, from Great Neck, N.Y., to a missile design

facility in Rancho Santa Margarita that was moved to Florida.