EC official sees big private chip investment

The European Chips Act has led to “promises for investments of the order of €100bil to expand the manufacturing capacity within the European Union by 2030”, EC's Skordas said. — Reuters

ANTWERP: The European Chips Act is on track to help attract more than €100bil (US$108.41bil) worth of private investment to the European semiconductor industry by 2030, a European Commission official says.

Thomas Skordas was speaking at a conference in Antwerp about the future of the initiative, which is Europe’s answer to similar programmes in the United States and Japan and to China’s support for its domestic computer chip makers.

The European Chips Act has led to “promises for investments of the order of €100bil to expand the manufacturing capacity within the European Union by 2030”, Skordas said.

The European Union Chips Act, billed as offering funding of €43bil, relies heavily on individual governments with the commission so far approving very little actual funding.

However, firms including Intel and TSMC have announced plans to build plants in Germany at a cost of more than €30bil this year.

Skordas, an official at the commission’s digital unit, said the commission expects to finalise funding for research and development pilot lines in four sub-sectors of the chip industry by September, including a €2.5bil grant for developing extremely advanced chips in Europe.

Skordas said unspecified funding for another pilot line to develop photonics, or chips that use light instead of electricity, is still in the works. — Reuters