Micron Breaks Ground For $15bn US Memory Chip Plant

Micron has broken ground for a $15 billion (£13bn) memory chip plant in Boise, Idaho, part of a plan to invest $40bn in US semiconductor manufacturing through the end of the decade.

Chief exeutive Sanjay Mehrotra also said the company would announce another US plant “in the coming weeks”, Reuters reported.

The firm is reportedly considering building an $80bn facility in Lockhart, Texas, 35 miles south of Austin.

The US investment plan was spurred by the Chips and Science Act signed into law last month, which provides $52bn to support domestic semiconductor manufacturing.

Chip shortages

The law was in turn spurred by ongoing chip shortages that have been one of the many side-effects of supply chain disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic.

Intel broke ground on Friday on a $20bn factory of its own in Ohio that is to produce high-end processor chips and which is part of its US investments subsidised by the Chips Act.

Micron said the Boise plant would be the first new memory chip factory built in the US in 20 years and would create 2,000 direct Micron jobs by the end of the decade. It is the biggest-ever private investment in Idaho.

The Boise plant and the upcoming factory are to produce DRAM memory chips widely used in data centres, PCs, automobiles and elsewhere.

High-end chips

Once the US plants are operational they are planned to account for 40 percent of Micron’s DRAM production worldwide, up from 10 percent today.

Micron said co-locating the fab with its research and development centre at its Boise headquarters would improve time to market.

“Our new leading-edge memory manufacturing fab will fuel US technology leadership, ensuring a reliable domestic supply of semiconductors that is critical to economic and national security,” Mehrotra said.

The plant is to become operational in 2025.

Domestic expansion

Most of Micron’s manufacturing takes place in places such as Japan, Taiwan and Singapore and Mehrotra said it is not planning to divest from any region, but is instead fuelling expansion in the US.

“To meet the growing demand for memory, we have to increase our production,” he told Reuters, adding that the “Chips and Science bill enables it to be increased here in the US.”

Micron controls about 11 percent of the memory chip market, with a key rival being China’s YMTC, which was founded only in 2016 but has already taken about 5 percent of the market.