Samsung Electronics Co. is considering an investment in a chip manufacturing plant that could cost up to $ 13 billion.
The South Korean company looks at two locations in Austin, Texas, two locations in Phoenix and one location in Genesee County in New York, sources tell The Wall Street Journal.
Samsung wants to take advantage of the opportunity to negotiate with the federal government because the US is working to rely less on Taiwan, China and South Korea, the sources said. Samsung will negotiate with the government for tax incentives and other incentives because it would be cheaper to develop its product in other parts of the world.
Incentives for the manufacture of chips were accepted in January with the National Defense Authorization Act, but the promise has not yet been received.
Samsung tries to compete Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), which is also based in the US and is the leader in the manufacturing industry here. TSMC wants $ 12 billion plant in Arizona in Bloomberg report.
“If Samsung really wants to achieve its goal of becoming the best disk maker by 2030, it needs to make massive investments in the US to catch up with TSMC,” said Greg Roh, senior vice president of HMC Securities. ‘TSMC is likely to continue to make progress with process nodes up to 3 nm at its Arizona plant, and Samsung may do the same. One challenging task is to secure EUV equipment now, when, Hynix and Micron also want to buy the machines. ”
Samsung’s goal is to put a chip factory into operation by October 2022 and employ 1,900 people. Consideration is being given to investing $ 10 billion in a plant near Austin, sources told Bloomberg.
The Austin City Council held a meeting in December after Samsung requested to rezone part of its industrial development land. In a brokerage report, it was found that Intel is likely to place more orders with Samsung, so it does not rely as much on TSMC.
Samsung wants to be the largest company in a $ 400 billion industry and plans to invest $ 116 billion in the next decade to make that happen.