US computer component manufacturer Seagate has announced plans to close its only remaining plant in Scotland which employs 85 people.

The company has shed more than 8,000 jobs globally in the past two years, including a factory in Livingston.

Its last production centre in Scotland, in Irvine, will shut in March.

The firm has been facing increasingly tough competition in the disc drive market.

Its shares fell so sharply on the stock market earlier this month that management decided to remove the listing from the New York Stock Exchange and run the business privately.

'Worst recession'

Management says a plant in California will take over the work done in Irvine.

The closure marks the end of a chapter in the Scottish high-tech sector which began when Seagate opened a microchip plant in Livingston in 1985.

Business began to suffer in the 1990s and the Livingston factory closed in February 1999 - with the loss of 263 jobs - after management failed to find a buyer.

At the time managing director Gordon Hutchinson told workers that the company was in the midst of its "worst recession in 25 years in the industry".

The California-based company, which has other plants in the Far East, is primarily a manufacturer of disc drives.

The industry has been suffering from a worldwide downturn which has led to the cancellation or closure of several other UK production sites.