Semiconductors: Intel to invest up to $4.6 billion for a new site in Poland

The American semiconductor giant Intel will invest up to 4.6 billion dollars to build a new site in Poland, with the creation of around 2,000 direct jobs, it announced in a press release on Friday. . This new site, which will be located in Wroclaw, in the south-east of the country, will be dedicated to the assembly and testing of semiconductors, in anticipation of "anticipated demand" in the coming years, Intel said. Several thousand indirect jobs should also be created. At a time when Europe is questioning its industrial sovereignty in this growing sector, Intel announced last year a major investment plan to produce electronic chips in Europe, up to 80 billion euros over ten years.

Intel already has a factory producing silicon wafers (very thin discs of semiconductor material on which integrated circuits and chips are etched) in Ireland, and also has a major investment project - for 17 billion euros - in Germany, in the Magdeburg region. The construction of this plant, which was to begin in the first half of 2023, has however still not started, in particular against a background of inflation. Additional public aid from Germany was envisaged, the German economy ministry recently acknowledged. The geographic proximity between these sites and proposed sites “will both improve the resilience and cost efficiency of the semiconductor supply chain in Europe,” Intel argues.

The production of semiconductors is at the heart of Europe's concerns, as they are so important for the industry of the future. The European Parliament and EU member states reached an agreement in mid-April on a plan to develop this industry in the region, to reduce its dependence on Asia. The stated objective is to reach 20% of world production in 2030, i.e. twice as much as today. At the same time, the United States has drawn hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies, via the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), particularly for this sector.