Indian minister says Intel is building a chip factory in the country. Intel says it's not. It's all quite awkward.
Yesterday India's transport minister is said to have announced Intel would be building a chipmaking fab in the country. Big news, right? Um, no. Actually, Intel isn't doing anything of the sort., the company says it has no current plans to build a manufacturing facility in the country.
This comes at a time when Intel is investing large sums of money into the chipmaking side of its business. Some of that money is coming from the recently passed CHIPS and Science Act, a US initiative to beef up domestic semiconductor manufacturing facilities, and that means it will be invested into US-based facilities and fabs.
Intel is also building a major chipmaking fab in Germany, which will be joined by other new or improved facilities in the EU. Yet nothing in India and apparently no plans to build there yet. That's despite India's best efforts to lure semiconductor companies to that region of the world. India's government recently announced aAccording to journalist Debby Qu, however, Intel may end up expanding in some capacity in India, in a roundabout way.
In May though, a consortium including Tower Semiconductor said it will invest 229 billion rupees in a chip fabrication plant in the southwest Indian state of Karnataka. A bit unclear what will happen to that.Though there's one thing that's very clear: governments are desperate to lure chipmakers to their shores, and when it comes down to it, that ultimately means a battle of who can woo a chipmaker more .