Rubicon closing in Batavia, consolidating with Bensenville plant
Rubicon Technology, a maker of synthetic sapphire products, is closing its six-year-old Batavia plant and consolidating it with one in Bensenville.
Batavia Mayor Jeff Schielke and Bensenville Village Administrator Evan Summers confirmed the news Friday, saying the towns had received letters from the company.
The letters do not say why the company is closing.
Company officials have not responded to requests for comment.
The Batavia closure affects about 50 people, 16 of whom will be laid off, and will happen by Dec. 31. And 17 of 100 Bensenville workers will be laid off by Nov. 21, Summers said.
The letter indicates the remaining Batavia employees will be transferred to the Bensenville and Franklin Park locations.
Rubicon products are used in industrial, optical and electronic products.
In its second-quarter earnings statement, the company's chief executive officer said prices and demand for sapphire products for light-emitting diode use had declined. In early September, it announced it would close a plant in Malaysia that produced items for the LED market.
Rubicon Technology started in Franklin Park in 2000. It opened a site in Bensenville in 2007, and the Batavia site in 2010, according to the company's website.
It also has facilities in South Korea, Taiwan and Japan.
Rubicon's stock, which traded on the Nasdaq as high as $33.17 in July 2010, was selling for about 60 cents a share Friday afternoon.
<h3 class="breakHead">Batavia electricity</h3>
Rubicon it was one of the top 10 Batavia electrical customers, according to a 2015 city report.
The city has also lost two others that were on that list: Sealy Mattress and the Party Lite candle-making factory. Sealy closed in 2015, and Party Lite will close by the end of November.
Keeping industrial customers is especially important, because Batavia's electrical utility has excess electricity. It has, through a power consortium, invested in the Prairie State Energy Campus coal-fired electricity plant, and is required to buy a certain amount of electricity produced by that plant every year, whether it needs it or not. When they made the deal, Batavia officials thought the city would continue to grow, requiring more electricity. They were also looking for a way to stabilize electrical costs in a recently deregulated market.
But the recession slowed growth. The electricity it is producing costs much more than was projected. Meanwhile, rates from other providers declined.
Although Batavia's residential customers have to use the city's electricity, industrial customers can buy from other suppliers. Batavia agreed to sell electricity to Rubicon, and some other businesses, at market rates.