In pursuit of its fab-lite strategy Atmel has announced the sale, for $124m, of its North Tyneside fab.

The disposal follows the sale of its Irving, Texas fab in May for $38m, its sale last year, of its French wafer fab for $140m and the announcement that it is looking for a buyer for its German fab.

Steve Laub, the CEO brought in by investors to replace ousted founding CEO George Perlegos, is pursuing a disposal strategy to boost Atmel’s profitability and share price, in a plan which persuaded shareholders not to vote in favour of a Perlegos come-back bid proposed to investors last May.

The closure of Tyneside, sale of its equipment to TSMC, and its land and buildings to Highbridge Business Park, means the loss of 600 jobs, and a claim from the Department for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform (formerly the DTI) for the return of a £19.9m grant.

The plant was built by Siemens Semiconductor and opened by the Queen in 1997. In 1998, Siemens announced the fab’s closure. In 2000 it was sold to Atmel which received a £30m regional development grant to re-open the fab.

At that time, Perlegos said Atmel would invest $500m in the plant to bring it up to 0.18micron processing. It was envisaged that the plant would create up to 1,500 jobs.