Bookham Technology was the highest profile victim in a depressing day of trading which saw Wall Street jitters over technology stocks impact hard on this side of the Atlantic.
The company, which makes fibre-optic components, took the mantle of the FTSE 100's biggest loser after shedding 11.3% to £21.50 as traders spent much of the day monitoring events stateside.
Yesterday's slide, which followed a 13% drop on Wednesday, means the company is now way off its £54.37 year high and sliding ever closer to the £16 low.
Hopes of a bounce in New York failed to materialise as the markets closed, with the main index dragged a further 65.5 points lower to 6,302.3.
The Techmark 100 index of technology companies fared worse, sliding 101.9 points to 3,355.78.
Logica was down 154p at £18.66, Sema shed a further 70p to 910p and Misys ended the session 48p lower at 709p.
They were not alone. Baltimore Technologies, the Irish internet security outfit, announced it was teaming up with Motorola, the US communications company, to develop secure solutions for mobile phones and other wireless devices.
But even Baltimore, which has outperformed the UK software sector by about 40% this year, saw its shares initially gain 4% before sliding back 24p to 527p.
AEA Technology, the science and engineering firm, had a dire day after issuing a profits warning due to a delay in the award of contracts. The stock plummeted almost 30% from 482.5p to end the session at 342.5p.
Telecommunications stocks were also out of favour with Cable & Wireless suffering a 6% fall to 897p and British Telecom not far behind as it slipped 16.5p to 737.5p in the wake of this week's advances.
But it was not all bad news. The pharmaceuticals sector, at least, had something to cheer as it contributed 14 points to the FTSE's haul for the day.
Shire Pharmaceuticals, replacing Woolwich following the acquisition of the mortgage bank by Barclays, celebrated its arrival in the FTSE 100 with its shares rising 35p to £13.85.
Glaxo Wellcome was 42p higher at £20.44, while SmithKline Beecham rose 19.5p at 931.5p. AstraZeneca, the Anglo-Swedish drugs group, which announced it was outsourcing its IT infrastructure services to IBM, climbed 46p to £32.16.
Most retailers were also looking healthy with Sainsbury adding 11.5p to 382.5p, Tesco inching up 5.75p to 262.75p and Safeway putting on 5.25p to 285.75p.
There was, however, little joy for beleaguered Marks & Spencer which lost a further 8p, representing just over 4%, to 175p.
The media sector was besieged with worries over advertising and ITV revenues which impacted strongly on the fortunes of Granada Media, which dropped 28p to 368p, and Carlton Communications, which lost 36p, or 6.3%, at 534p.
BSkyB, the satellite broadcaster, bucked the sector trend to enjoy a buoyant time with its stock up 23p to 885p.
Banks had a generally poor day with Barclays going down 24p at £18.80, HSBC slipping 15p to 968p and Lloyds TSB losing 3p to close at 657p.
Elsewhere, shares in Churchill China, the British ceramic products maker, rose 11p to 157.5p after the company said trading was exceeding expectations.
The improvement, it said, came from progress in its "Dining In" division where sales in north America were higher than last year.
Imperial Chemical Industries was another gainer, up 15p at 412p on the strength of positive comment from its broker UBS Warburg.
Away from the turmoil of the main FTSE 100 index, life was fairly tranquil with the FTSE Midcap 250, which crawled 5.3 points higher to end at 6,549.7.
