Intel Breaks Ground on $20-Billion Arizona Plants as US Chip Factory Race Heats Up

The new Arizona plants will also be the first Intel has built from the ground up with space reserved for outside customers.

Intel Breaks Ground on $20-Billion Arizona Plants as US Chip Factory Race Heats Up

Photo Credit: Reuters

Intel rival TSMC has also purchased land to build its first US campus in Phoenix

Highlights
  • Intel is establishing two new chip plants in Arizona
  • The plants are aimed to produce "thousands" of wafers per week
  • Intel also plans to announce another US campus site before year-end
Advertisement

Intel on Friday broke ground on two new factories in Arizona as part of its turnaround plan to become a major manufacturer of chips for outside customers.

The $20 billion plants — dubbed Fab 52 and Fab 62 — will bring the total number of Intel factories at its campus in Chandler, Arizona, to six. They will house Intel's most advanced chipmaking technology and play a central role in the Santa Clara, California-based company's effort to regain its lead in making the smallest, fastest chips by 2025, after having fallen behind rival Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing.

The new Arizona plants will also be the first Intel has built from the ground up with space reserved for outside customers. Intel has long made its own chips, but its turnaround plan calls for taking on work for outsiders such as Qualcomm, Amazon.com's cloud unit, as well as deepening its manufacturing relationship with the US military.

"We want to have more resilience to the supply chain," Intel Chief Executive Pat Gelsinger, who earlier in the week attended a White House meeting on the global chip shortage, told Reuters in an interview. "As the only company on US soil that can do the most advanced lithography processes in the world, we are going to step up in a big way."

Gelsinger said it was too early to say how much of the new plants' capacity would be reserved for outside customers. He said the plants would produce "thousands" of wafers per week.

Wafers are the silicon discs on which chips are made, and each can hold hundreds or even thousands of chips.

Intel rival TSMC has also purchased land to build its first US campus in Phoenix, not far from Intel's location, where TSMC plans up to six chip factories , Reuters previously reported.

Gelsinger said Intel plans to announce another US campus site before the end of the year that will eventually hold eight chip factories.

© Thomson Reuters 2021


This week on Orbital, the Gadgets 360 podcast, we discuss the Surface Pro 8, Go 3, Duo 2, and Laptop Studio — as Microsoft sets a vision for Windows 11 hardware. Orbital is available on Spotify, Gaana, JioSaavn, Google Podcasts, Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music and wherever you get your podcasts.
Affiliate links may be automatically generated - see our ethics statement for details.
Comments

For the latest tech news and reviews, follow Gadgets 360 on X, Facebook, WhatsApp, Threads and Google News. For the latest videos on gadgets and tech, subscribe to our YouTube channel. If you want to know everything about top influencers, follow our in-house Who'sThat360 on Instagram and YouTube.

Further reading: Intel, Intel Fab 52, Intel Fab 62, Arizona
Lithuania Looks to Ban 'Untrustworthy' Phones After Chinese Censorship Concerns
Microsoft Surface Duo to Get Android 11 Before End of Year, Company Reportedly Confirms
Share on Facebook Gadgets360 Twitter Share Tweet Snapchat Share Reddit Comment google-newsGoogle News
 
 

Advertisement

Follow Us

Advertisement

© Copyright Red Pixels Ventures Limited 2024. All rights reserved.
Trending Products »
Latest Tech News »