The Biden administration is providing $162 million to Microchip Technology to support the domestic production of computer chips — the second funding announcement tied to a 2022 law designed to revive U.S. semiconductor manufacturing.
The incentives include $90 million to improve a plant in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and $72 million to expand a factory in Gresham, Oregon, the Commerce Department said. The investments would enable Microchip Technology to triple its domestic production and reduce its dependence on foreign factories.
Much of the money would fund the making of microcontrollers, which are used by the military as well as in autos, household appliances and medical devices. Government officials said they expected the investments to create 700 construction and manufacturing jobs over the next decade.
I’m not an expert on this subject, but it seems the majority of the jobs would betemporary. They loop construction and manufacturing into a single number. Would be interested to see how many “permanent” jobs are being created with this money, and maybe even a ROI/break even time scale on those tax dollars.
I assume the vast majority of operations within any microchip factory will be robotic/automated. Meaning a large percentage of that 700 is likely on the construction side. Not poo pooing those per say, but makes it harder to see the full picture.
I think reducing dependency is a huge gain here and probably the more important point. We all saw what happened with the shortages.
Beyond that, I don’t know what the portion is that is construction. There might be a lot of oversight and QA positions. But even temporary jobs are good. If it takes a year to build, people are getting paid for a year.
Right, hence “not poo pooing those jobs” as they are certainly important, and construction jobs are always temporary (unless they’re apparently road construction ones :) )
It’s just always vague the net new in that area.
No doubt, getting more important manufacturing in country is a big win.
While there is a lot of automation on the factory floor, there is still a ton of support staff needed, particularly for maintenance of the hardware and infrastructure.