Entegris Thursday celebrated receiving a $75 million preliminary award from the U.S. Commerce Department last month for construction of a new manufacturing plant in northwest Colorado Springs with federal, state and local officials.
Speakers at the ceremony at the construction site of the 130,000-square-foot plant, which will open next year, said the facility will play a key role in strengthening the semiconductor industry’s supply chain by bringing manufacturing of critical components and materials back to the U.S. More than 60% of all semiconductors and 90% of the most advanced chips are produced in Taiwan, which China claims as part of its territory and has threatened to invade.
Arati Prabhakar, director of the White House of Science and Technology Policy, said the semiconductor industry had become “dangerously concentrated in one part of the world, and that has enormous consequences and implications. It is important for our economy, supply chain and jobs and it is important to national security because we have a real critical vulnerability” with so much chip manufacturing located in Taiwan.
Entegris signed a preliminary agreement with the department last month that is subject to negotiating a final contract for the award under the Creating Helpful Incentives to Produce Semiconductors (CHIPS) and Science Act. The company also received nearly $115 million in local and state financial incentives for the project. The company plans to hire nearly 600 employees for the plant over the next several years, and the project is expected to create another 1,741 jobs in the local economy, according to the Colorado Springs Chamber & EDC.
Colorado Springs joins the Albuquerque, N.M.; Portland, Oregon, and Austin, Texas, areas as the only metropolitan areas with multiple CHIPS Act awards. Microchip Technology signed a preliminary agreement in January for a $90 million award to expand its Colorado Springs plant. The department has signed similar agreements for $55.1 billion in grants and loans to 13 companies for 23 projects in 14 states.
Entegris CEO Bertrand Loy said the award, the first made to a chip industry supplier, “is not just about increase manufacturing capacity in the U.S., but it is about building a resilient, domestic infrastructure in support of the semiconductor industry. Semiconductor fabs require a reliable and uninterrupted supply of critical materials and process solutions. This funding is a critical cornerstone of making this vision a reality.”
The plant will produce silicon wafer handling products called front-opening unified pods that are now manufactured outside the U.S. and liquid filtration products, both used in semiconductor manufacturing. A planned second phase of the plant would add manufacturing space for advanced liquid filters, purifiers and fluid handling systems. The site of the plant could accommodate up to 700,000 square feet of manufacturing space and up to 1,000 employees.
The award “will enable Entegris, Colorado Springs and the state to play a meaningful role in expanding the U.S. semiconductor industry,” said Bill Shaner, president and general manager of the company’s advanced materials handling operation in Colorado Springs. The $75 million will “not only support the growth of the semiconductor industry in the U.S., but further establish Colorado as a major technology hub for advanced semiconductor manufacturing nationwide.”
