Peabody Medical Device Co.'s Japanese Facilities Escape Quake, Tsunami Damage

As the world watches the aftermath of the earthquake and tsunami that struck Japan this month, officials at a Peabody medical device firm are counting their blessings that their employees and their families who work there are safe.

Patricia Corkum, who serves a JEOL USA's marketing manager at the company U.S. subsidiary on Dearborn Road, said that is what company officials here have learned after one of the most deadly natural disasters in recorded history struck Japan.

"As far as we can tell and as far as we learned so far, all of our employees and their families are okay so far," Corkum said. "The factories there were surprisingly in okay shape."

According to a company statement published on its Web site, two manufacturing facilities located in Akishima, Tokyo as well as Tendo located in the Yamagata Prefecture did not sustain any significant damage.

But work in those facilities located north of Tokyo has been very minimal because much of Japan's transportation infrastructure used to move people and goods across the country has suffered extensive damage, Corkum said. The sales office located in Sendai, a community much closer to the heart of the most extensive damage caused by the earthquake and the tsunami, was more affected, she said.

Company officials say scheduled blackouts are also making it difficult to maintain normal operation. They also said the company's ability to ship equipment and parts from its Japanese operations will only resume as the country's electrical power and transportation services improves.

Some JEOL USA employees have returned to work in the two factories, but most have not because they simply have no way to get to work, Corkhum said.

JEOL USA employs 3,000 people worldwide and 300 in the U.S. Corkum said roughly half of the company's U.S. employees work in Peabody and the company has maintained a presence in the city since 1979.

The firm manufactures very specialized medical devices such as scanning electron microscopes, Mass spectrometers, and electron beam lithography, according to the company's Web site.

Corkum said communication with JEOL USA's Japanese facilities has been very sporadic since the natural disaster occurred on March 11. She said company officials in Peabody continue to pray for their continued safety.

"We just kind of keep our ears tuned for hourly or daily news from them," she said.

Corkum could not comment on how the disruption in work overseas is affected JEOL USA as a whole.

"From a business perspective, we will know more as the days go by," she said.