Close observers of Spokane-area business happenings have to feel a bit shell-shocked following the announced sales so far this year of three key longtime employers here—Telect Inc., Avista Corp., and Pathology Associates Medical Laboratories—to far-off purchasers.

Telect, a 35-year-old, Liberty Lake-based telecommunications equipment manufacturer, was acquired last month by Wallingford, Conn.-based industry giant Amphenol Corp.

Avista, the longtime Spokane-based utility once known as Washington Water Power Co., said last month that Toronto-based Hydro One will acquire it in a transaction valued at $5.3 billion U.S.

Meanwhile, Laboratory Corp. of America Holding, a Burlington, N.C.-based company that does business as LabCorp, announced in February that it had agreed to acquired Spokane-based Pathology Associates Medical Laboratories, as well as PAML’s interest in a number of joint ventures.

To be sure, the loss of those employers’ local headquarters or at least ultimate decision-making power is a disheartening blow, while the pending Avista sale also concerningly will reduce to seven the number of publicly traded companies still based in the Spokane-Coeur d’Alene area. 

On the bright side, it could have been much worse.

Telect CEO Wayne Williams says there are no plans to move that business, now doing business as Amphenol Telect, and Amphenol wants to retain its culture and employees, which is encouraging to hear. 

Williams told the Journal in an interview prior to the announced sale that the company’s revenue grew by 24 percent last year and is expected to increase at least 17 percent this year, also a positive indicator.

Avista, which employs about 1,600 people, will maintain its corporate headquarters in Spokane and will continue to operate as a standalone utility serving Washington, Idaho, and Oregon, says company chairman, president, and CEO Scott Morris. As part of its arrangement with Hydro One, the company also will maintain its executive team and its own board of directors, which is great to hear. Morris also says there will be no workforce reductions as a result of the transaction.

Among these three transactions, some of the biggest concerns about potential job losses here have focused on PAML, which as of last November had more than 800 employees in Spokane.

LabCorp somewhat ominously didn’t comment on the future of the operation here in a press release it issued May 4 about completing the PAML transaction, other than to say there would be no significant changes to operations or services until next year after all joint venture transactions are completed.

However, a company spokesman’s comments to the Journal last week—and reported on the front page of this issue—about plans by LabCorp to make Spokane its primary lab site in the western U.S. for workplace and toxicology tests are reason for optimism.

Here’s hoping that the upbeat news coming from these important—albeit no longer Spokane-based—local employers continues.