U. S. chip giant Intel will invest up to $4. 6 billion to build a new one in Poland, creating about 2,000 jobs, the company said Friday.
Its new facility, which will be located in the southern Polish city of Wroclaw, “will meet the critical call for gathering and testing capability that Intel plans to meet through 2027,” Intel said in a statement.
The investment in Poland is aimed at helping the European Union expand a more resilient semiconductor supply chain and reduce dependence on Asia, he added.
Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki hailed the announcement as “cementing and consolidating transatlantic cooperation” with the United States.
“From now on, thanks to this investment by Intel, Poland will be a key component of the not-so-extensive sourcing formula of those technologies of maximum complexity,” Morawiecki told reporters in Wroclaw.
Intel is one of the world’s leading semiconductor companies, producing a wide range of products and adding state-of-the-art chips.
The EU aims to recover 20% of semiconductor production capacity by 2030, double its current production and has invested billions in Intel chip services in Germany and Ireland.
Intel said its European sites would contribute to the profitability of the EU supply chain and that it plans to produce €80 billion worth of chips in Europe over ten years.
Intel said the structure of its factory in Germany, which is expected to start in the first part of 2023, has still begun, partly due to inflation.
Germany’s Ministry of Economic Affairs said it plans to structure with more publicArray
The announcement of Intel’s new developments in Poland follows a challenging first quarter of 2023 for the company.
In April, it announced a big drop in sales for the January-March era due to a sharp drop in demand for semiconductors, especially those used in PCs.
The company has also been hit by declining demand for chips that force data centers and is struggling to compete with Nvidia for the semiconductors that underpin generative AI à la ChatGPT, a new chip-hungry sector.
The chip industry is well known for its volatility, with demand and oscillating with the ups and downs of the global economy.
Its central role in the global supply chain became evident at the height of the Covid pandemic.
Lockdowns and sanitary restrictions have reduced production in Asia, leaving the growing demand for chips unmet just as everyone goes online to work, buy groceries and have fun.
Semiconductors have also become a political pawn between the U. S. and China. Washington urged allies to avoid supplying China with state-of-the-art chips.