About 20 workers at JT Packard's Verona headquarters are out of a job after a Memphis, Tenn. corporation bought the tech company earlier this week.
Thomas and Betts Corp. announced Jan. 20 that it would buy Packard's net assets for $22 million and assume $6 million of the company's debt.
The sale was finalized Tuesday. Tricia Bergeron, spokesperson for Thomas and Betts, said Thursday that the company laid off about 15 percent of Packard's staff.
About 150 of Packard's 300 employees had worked at two offices in Verona at 275 Investment Court and just up the road at 312 Locust St. The rest are located around the United States. That means 20 Verona workers lost their jobs and about 20 more nationwide are out of work, too.
Bergeron said the layoffs resulted from staffing that overlapped between Packard and Thomas and Betts. She said no more layoffs are planned and that Thomas and Betts is committed to growing JT Packard.
Founded in 1997, Packard's core business is servicing uninterruptible power supplies, which are basically large battery systems that prevent businesses from losing data during a power outage. Revenues in 2009 were about $60 million.
Thomas and Betts, a publicly traded global company with sales of nearly $2.5 billion in 2008, has 9,000 employees worldwide. It makes electrical components and produces commercial heating and ventilation units and steel structures used for utility transmission, according to a company news release.
Bergeron said Thomas and Betts manufactures the type of equipment Packard services, and that they will "look to JT Packard for expertise on the service component of this industry.
"We bought the business because they have excellent relations with their customers... And they were a much stronger player (in servicing equipment) than we were. We definitely hired them for their expertise," she said.
The announced sale comes after a series of twists and turns for Packard.
In 2006, it got a commitment from Verona for about $1 million of tax-increment financing assistance for an expansion but ended up staying put. Later that year, it was purchased by S.R. Bray of Anaheim, Calif., through its subsidiary, Power Plus!, and its founder, Jeff Cason, left the company. But Bray ran into financial trouble the past two years after investing heavily in construction services in California and other southwestern states.
The company last June filed for receivership in California, which opened the door for Bray to sell off Packard - one of its biggest assets - to appease creditors, Charleston told the Verona Press last December.
On Dec. 1, Packard notified the state that all 300 employees would be laid off and both Verona locations would close Feb. 1. But Charleston said that notice was "misleading," just a formality, and that no one was expected to lose their jobs. He said Packard would be sold for $14 million to Sangamon Industries I, Inc., an affiliate of Chicago-based private equity firm Pfingsten Partners, LLC, or possibly a higher bidder at a Jan. 18 auction. Thomas and Betts emerged with the winning bid at that auction, Bergeron said.
Gregory Charleston, Packard's chief restructuring officer, directed inquiries to Thomas and Betts.
A former Packard employee who said she was laid off Tuesday afternoon called the situation "depressing."
"Especially when just two weeks ago we were all assured we would have jobs," said the woman, who asked to not have her name used. "This was not JT Packard's decision, I am positive of that."
