https://archive.is/66jAS

This is actually a brilliant location for them. One of those places that has much more going for it than people not from the region would realize.

International airport, large rail depot, extremely low cost of living and a city/region that has more good restaurants and activities than might be expected. Ohio State University is in the city and is a huge school that is rapidly growing in academic standing. Road transit in the area is also very good allowing access to any part of the city from any other part in rapid fashion. Good schools, relatively low crime, etc. Probably the only drawback, from a lifestyle point of view, would be the winter and that's not even that bad, compared to other winter regions.

This same street has a Facebook data center, an AWS data center, and a Google data center (within a couple of miles). There is a biotech research campus, Bath & Bodyworks main research lab, and the main operations center for AEP (a midwest electric company). If you travel about 2-3 miles orthogonal to that street we have a big data center for Nationwide Insurance, a campus for Discover (credit cards), and a State Farm insurance facility.

It is literally across street from one of the Ohio East-2 availability zones. If they were making rack-mounted server boards, they could just walk them across the street and plug them into the cloud.

Intel said the same thing for Arizona as well. Initial $20B investment which could expand to $100B. So they are building it in two places. I wonder why they dont keep it all in Arizona? ( May be Tax Break, but I have no idea how Tax Break works in US )

And if you include their (expected) expansion in EUR, Intel is layering the foundation for Foundry Services. Compared to its half assed Custom Foundry in 2012/2013 with little to zero CapEx increase. Foundry Services 2.0 is very real.

Note: Investor Notes from ASML are also interesting, suggesting Intel may be ahead in terms of High-NA EUV orders. Initial shipment expected in 2023.

Good luck to them! Always nice to get as much semiconducter talent in-country as possible, fabs are a pretty crucial supply line after all.

I'd imagine most people would want a pretty significant pay raise to move to somewhere like Ohio, but they are nearby Ohio State University, so maybe they'll get local talent.

Couldn't find much info on the process size in the Reuters article, but the Intel press release[0] says this:

" “The Ohio factories are designed for the ‘Angstrom era,’ with support for Intel’s most advanced process technologies, including Intel 18A."

This[1] doesn't give a transistor density for 18A, but the 20A transistor density is greater than the TMSC 3nm, fwiw.

[0] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/intel-... [1] https://www.anandtech.com/show/16823/intel-accelerated-offen...

Does anyone know why Intel would want to build a "mega-site" in the city of Columbus Ohio? Why not choose Cleveland Ohio where one has port access with an existing route to Europe? Fabs are international affairs, no matter where they're rooted, because just to keep the place running one needs a constant stream of parts from everywhere. It seems like being in a sea/rail/truck hub would be a logistics advantage.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_of_Cleveland

Edit: On second thought, Arizona doesn't have port access either so I guess it's not really a significant consideration.

Wow, it really takes an insane amount of money these days to make a leading edge fab. I really hope they can pull this off and it doesn't end up like Foxconn in Wisconsin...

its a shame we didn't see this type of investment after the rust belt area crashed in 2008. if we had more domestic chip plants, we probably wouldn't be in the current chip shortage rn

chip fab/manufacturing process probably doesn't generate as many jobs as the auto industry (the process is automated heavily from what I have seen) at its peak but at least they will be very high paying.

I’m for global competition as a force as much as the next thinking person, but as an American who grew up on Intel chips it sure would be nice to not get our asses kicked all over the field for a change. The ASML stuff seems to indicate they might mean it this time.

"largest investment in Ohio's history" "the largest semiconductor manufacturing location on the planet"

What is it that makes Ohio such a key and ideal place for such a massive investment? I assume there must be an abundance of energy + work force + land available that makes this possible, as well as a foundation built up by the Rust Belt.

Could the Rust Belt go Silicon?

When it comes to proximity research institutions, the choice of location is strange to me. Somewhere in the northern Indiana/Illinois/Michigan (i.e. "Greater Michiana") would have made a lot more sense. That way, you would be close to,

UIUC, Northwestern, UChicago, UMichigan, Purdue, Notre Dame, UIndiana, Argonne National Lab, etc.

This is great news. Letting China/Taiwan be the one stop shop for everything is going to be a big mistake in the next decade or two, it also reflects badly on the USA that we are completely dependent on a foreign power as much as we are. The current market has show that it won't price in externalities such as future wars (and cold wars) and only government pushes here and there will help it along. Intel is seeing the potential for that I believe, given the shortages and such. They certainly have the expertise to make these other types of chips that the US market has all but given up on. I think the big thing is we need to at least have the equivalent capability to what we are getting from Taiwan because it has become clear that China is not going to allow them to be independent for much longer, particularly under Xi.

How do the economics work here? Intel's market cap is $215B.

I wonder if big workforce investments like this in states like Ohio and Texas will eventually impact political leanings in the immediate area... will be interesting to see if anything's changed 10 years in

One fab will use 12 high-NA EUV machines from ASML and their price will be "well over $340 million". They will be spending more than $4B per fab just for for ASML machines.

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/01/intel-says-ohio-...

I have been told, but can't verify, that Intel was looking at placing this in Texas but that the power grid issues ruled that out. Can anyone confirm?

Is it true that once such a plant is built, the number of skilled workers to keep it running is actually relatively low?

I.e. some operational "dev-ops" style engineers who can fix and troubleshoot highly automated lines, keep the thing running. People to supervise the systems, some workers to handle raw materials, etc. and then the packaging on the output side. But in general, quite sparse for a million square foot property, compared to other industries occupying a building of that size?

I wonder partly because the favorable tax / labor jurisdictions aren't exactly where you tend to find extremely skilled silicon engineers. But an operational plant is maybe not where those folks are needed.

With all of this recent chip investment, would anyone with more familiarity with the industry care to comment about how much this is driven by:

1) pre-existing long term plans

2) more recent supply chain bottlenecks

3) Some combination of 1 & 2

Bonus: How China may figure into the equation

If its anywhere near Cleveland, the CPU codename writes itself:

  Alder Lake
  Sky Lake
  Kaby Lake
  Mistake Lake

> An initial $20 billion investment - the largest in Ohio's history - on a 1,000-acre site in New Albany will create 3,000 jobs

I grew up just north of there. An Intel factory nearby would be good news for anyone in the rust belt. I hope this doesn't fizzle out like Wisconsin's Foxconn plant.

I’m excited by this news for two reasons. I hope it bodes well for macro-economic political policies to bring well-paid jobs back to the US.

I’m also optimistic that this will inspire other companies (ie Apple) to double down on their CSR commitments and invest more into domestic manufacturing.

It’s because of water access, and Ohio basically bent over backwards to give Intel anything they wanted, included long-term sabotage of its own tax base in exchange for promises of jobs and other benefits. Ohio was the lowest, most pliant bidder.

I've actually been considering a move to Ohio this June. Any suggestions for whetr in Ohio I should look? My main consideration is low CoL as I work remotely but I'd like there to be stuff to do within a reasonable driving distance.

Bigger than these 5 monstrosities?

http://shorturl.at/yHLW2

Oddly, my mental autocomplete filled in 'white elephant' before the parser got to 'chip plant'.

Sincere question: How polluting are fabs? When I read "access to water," it scares me.

Manufacturing Jobs Are Never Coming Back

https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/manufacturing-jobs-are-...

Is this going by the size of the employees or the square footage?

I so wish they would've picked Cleveland over Columbus

This is the kind of manufacturing the Midwest needs.

Excellent. Hope it works out long-term.

Really disappointed in many of the negative and insecure comments coming from members of this community saying “Ohio sucks” or “Ohio State University sucks because it’s not Stanford” or “how many startups does Ohio have”. It really reflects poorly on those making these comments and I can’t help but think seeing a state not on the east or west coast being selected is causing fear and uncertainty in the lives of those who wrap up their personality in being in California or something.

People in Ohio are excited about this and all of the negativity, frankly, is just unwelcome.

Think the Midwest and Ohio suck because there aren’t mountains or an ocean? What good is any of that from behind your keyboard with the A/C on or sitting on your couch watching the same Netflix special as everyone else? Meanwhile in 5 hours I can be on your beach and enjoying all the best parts of where you live with 0 downside.

Think Ohio State sucks? Right because Stanford has always been a top 5 university from day one and everything is static forever.

Intel employs “low skill people and they’re not startup software engineering jobs” ok? What actual value does your privacy-evading ad tech addiction company add over honest people who just want a job making actual things? I guess Tesla employs low skill people in Austin at the Gigafactory too?

Don’t like Ohio? Good we don’t care. You don’t have to live here and we have never needed to care about your opinion. You don’t have a monopoly on talent or anything else except maybe people who think that because their license plate says something different that somehow they’re better than us. Seriously grow up.

-edit-

It’s not just comments here. Here’s one out in the wild: https://twitter.com/terronk/status/1484599015828176898?s=21

Piss off.

And you know what? For all those comments “blah blah there’s only family to move there for” like yea. Exactly. Maybe you should too. I don’t have to get my social life from doomscrolling on Facebook and making myself depressed. I actually have friends and family that I see everyday and can count on. We cook meals together and help each other. We play board games, celebrate birthdays, and like being near each other. These social media apps are filling a void that you created for yourself. I like visiting California and can live there if I want to. I choose my family and friends. Maybe you should too and get off your holier-than-thou attitude.

"Up to $100B". Okay. I planned on spending up to $100B for my wife's Christmas present. I actually ended up spending $75 + tax.

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Finally.

I have in-laws in the Columbus area and have visited there several times.

You might be able to pay us to live there, but it would have to be 'retire after a year' kind of money. It has all the charm of a strip mall.