People are getting tired of seeing these types of headlines over and over again but THIS one hits close to home for me. I moved here to Richmond in 1997 in support of Qimonda, at that time it was called White Oak Semiconductor, a joint venture of Motorola and Siemans AG. It was the talk of the city at the time because of the huge potential for growth and the high tech, high paying jobs that it would provide.
All here were hoping that a bailout package from the German government, the state of Saxon (in Germany, and the Portugese government would save the company. The bailout was contingent on Qimonda's parent (Infineon AG) matching the funding that ws offered, however Infineon did not play (must be a bunch of Richard Shelby and David Vitter wanabe's in charge).
In the past Richmond held its unemployment rate between 2-3%. Now this Qimonda closure comes on the heals of the insovency of Circuit City, also based here in Richmond. It is going to be tough for this area to sustain the loss of so many jobs.
I am OK for now because I don't work for Qimonda, but I feel like this economic situation is like a monster thatt is starting to catch up with me and is getting closer and closer.