A company with a location in Florence, which cut 65 jobs late last year, is now announcing it will trim 300 more jobs and close its facility in Florence, ESAB Welding and Cutting executives announced Wednesday.

ESAB, which early last year had 425 Florence workers, first announced last Summer that 65 workers would be let go in November of 2014 as their positions were moved to locations in Texas and Mexico.

Now, 300 more workers will be cut from the Florence location as finance, accounting, customer service, inside sales, and training functions all will be moved to Denton, Texas, the company announced.  

The cuts announced Wednesday also include manufacturing jobs that will move to Mexico and Texas.

The South Ebenezer Road facility in Florence is scheduled to be closed by March 31, 2016, and “transfer opportunities” will be possible for some jobs, officials said.

The company will move the few remaining workers to a new facility in Florence in 2016.

Those Florence positions will be in sales, marketing, marketing communications, and capital goods sales as well as personnel from order engineering (SIP), IT, and human resources, company officials said.

Less than 4 years ago, ESAB in Florence opened a new multi-million-dollar automation process center and a training facility demonstrating state of the art welding and cutting equipment.

When the facility opened, ESAB North America President and CEO Andrew Masterman said the $3.5 million investment, showed a long standing commitment to Florence and South Carolina.

At the time, new jobs were planned and leaders hoped the new facility would attract business from around the world to train in the new state-of-the-art facility.

The layoffs announced last Summer came after ESAB purchased Victor Technologies and the two businesses are being integrated.

The manufacturing for gas apparatus and manual plasma products were moved out of Florence late last year to Denton, Texas and Hermosillo, Mexico.

ESAB bought Victor Technology Holdings in April 2014 which combined several brands into one company in the global welding and cutting market.Just under 100 workers were laid off from ESAB in April 2009.

ESAB is owned by Colfax Corporation (NYSE: CFX) a global manufacturer of gas- and fluid-handling and fabrication technology products.

ESAB is one of the world’s largest manufacturers of welding consumables, welding and cutting equipment, and associated automation.

Founded in 1904, ESAB offers products for many welding and cutting processes and applications. The company has manufacturing facilities on five continents and more than 8,000 workers.

ESAB has been in Florence since the late 1980s — before that, the facility was owned by Union Carbide.