They also sold their XRD business to Rigaku in March 2015. Another part of the old Varian business carved up. They've closed or sold most of the old Varian now. Why did they buy it? I am not sure how many will lose their jobs, I think most of the XRD group will become Rigaku employees? But I am not sure. Like most things recently the company does not share a lot of information with its employees It will mostly impact their academic business. I agree with the previous poster's implication, IMO the company's recent commitment to the Academic instrument business and especially XRD has been questionable. Definitely, a lot of unhappy employees at the moment.
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I think the next divestiture will be Dako. Agilent are dumping everything that doesn't fit and 2 years on Dako still does not fit and Agilent have no clear strategy for capturing market share in clinical or even entering it. The DAKO side is business as usual, FDA issues aside and Agilent just won't invest or make a decision on the instrument side. When they announced the new LSAG the clinical business was not even mentioned in any detail. I suspect if it happens, it may also involve the genomics business as well. Genomics also does not fit in clearly with the core instrument and support business. Genomics is not a perfect match for Dako either, but it's markets are either Academic and or clinical and Agilent are clearly not interested in the Academic market. Rumour has it, genomics is earmarked for restructuring after the LS/CA side is restructured into LSAG, so probably more layoffs to come, that is if they don't sell Dako or genomics.