Boise’s Micron Technology on Tuesday announced a $100 billion investment in what will be the largest domestic semiconductor manufacturing plant in US history, to be built in Clay, New York, a Syracuse suburb.
The 40 football fields-worth of clean room space is about four times the size of the facility Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra announced for Boise a month ago. That $15 billion expansion is expected to be complete by the end of this decade.
"The New York Fab is central to Micron's strategy to grow US memory production to 10% of the global supply in the next decade, and to even a bigger percentage in the decade beyond," Mehrotra said during an announcement event at Syracuse University. The event was streamed by the Post-Standard Newspaper.
Micron is currently the only memory chip producer in the United States, with 2% of the global market share.
Mehrotra says the company will spend up to $100 billion over 20 years at the New York site, with at least $20 billion invested by the end of this decade. Around 50,000 jobs will be tied to the plant; some 9,000 of which will be directly employed by Micron.
"Success for us will also be to make sure that we're really able to participate in the community, support the community with diverse talent; training, recruitment, advancement, supporting STEM education," Mehrotra explained.
New York state gave the company $5.5 billion in incentives to build there, and along with $52 billion in federal incentives provided to Micron and other semiconductor manufacturers in the CHIPS and Science Act passed in August, which provided enough to keep the company from adding manufacturing capacity overseas.
Mehrotra would not say where else the company had looked to build, but it had already applied for tax breaks and been negotiating with the city of Lockhart, Texas to build there. Austin's KVUE reported officials were 'disappointed' in Micron's decision, but a lead negotiator told KVUE, "The art of dealmaking is knowing when to, you know, say, 'That's my best offer. It's my best and final.'"
Other factors in the decision, Mehrotra said, included cost-of-living, strong schools and the local urban/outdoor lifestyle opportunities in Clay.
"The diverse talent pool here, the university, the education system, the reliability of power and water, alignment with Micron's sustainability goals and of course, the support here from the state as well," Mehrotra said.
Memory chips are expected to begin rolling off the line in New York in 2025. Micron’s stock - reeling of late due to a slow in chip demand - rose alongside the broader market Tuesday, up 4.33%.
