The new factory will be at GlobalFoundries’ “Fab 8” site in upstate New York
Chipmaker GlobalFoundries has announced that it will build a second factory near its New York headquarters and invest $1 billion to boost output to address the global chip shortage.
The new factory will be at GlobalFoundries’ “Fab 8” site in upstate New York, where its headquarters moved from California earlier this year, the company said at an event announcing the plans.
The factory will double the site’s chipmaking capacity and add 1,000 jobs, with funding from private-public partnerships, including federal and state investments.
GlobalFoundries plans to spend $1 billion immediately to boost the existing factory’s output by 150,000 wafers per year. Wafers are the silicon discs on which semiconductors are made in bulk, and each one can contain thousands of chips.
The U.S. has been accelrating efforts to localise the chip manufacturing process amidst the raging chip crisis that has crippled automakers and electronic makers alike all across the globe. Talking about the US’ plans during the event, U.S. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said, “We don’t just want to create four, five or six more fabs, though we do want to do that. We need the whole ecosystem.”
GlobalFoundries is owned by the United Arab Emirates’ sovereign wealth fund Mubadala Investment Co. Recently, there were reports of Intel considering buying out the chipmaker for $30 billion.
However, Reuter now says that Mubadala is planning to take GlobalFoundries public in an initial public offering with a source adding that there are no active discussions with Intel yet, and Mubadala is focused on taking GlobalFoundries public as planned.
