Boeing to lay off 750 SoCal workers after losing contract

The Boeing Co. will lay off 750 Southern California employees after losing a lucrative military satellite contract and seeing a dip in demand for the technology, the company said Wednesday.

The cuts involving engineers at plants in El Segundo and Seal Beach will take the staff of Boeing Space and Intelligence Systems, the company's satellite division, from 7,200 employees to about 6,450.

"The stretching out of government contract awards, along with a continuing lighter demand in the commercial marketplace for large, high-powered satellites, has created a surplus in the work force," satellite division chief Craig Cooning said.

The Pentagon announced last week that it selected Lockheed Martin Corp. over Boeing for an Air Force contract worth up to $3.57 billion to build as many as 12 next-generation global positioning satellites.

The deal was the first of three awards intended to supply a total of 32 satellites for the Pentagon's new GPS III system. Manufacturing the first satellites puts Lockheed in a strong position to win the two follow-on contracts, analysts said.

Major satellite competitions involving Boeing for Air Force, NASA and other government satellite contracts have also been delayed with no winner announced, Boeing spokesman Lewis Brinson said.

The cuts mark the latest blow to Boeing's Southern California operations.

In 2006, the Chicago-based aerospace company began shutting down production of C-17 military cargo planes at its Long Beach plant. It was the last major airplane factory left in Southern California, which once dominated the nation's aerospace industry.

Boeing said the first 100 satellite employees will be laid off in July. The remaining 650 workers will be released in July and August.

The company said it will help the employees find jobs at other Boeing locations.

Some of the regional industry's recent setbacks could be offset by increased business from the KC-45 tanker contract recently awarded to Northrop Grumman Corp., which the company says will create some 7,500 new aerospace jobs in California.