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Intel's $20B Ohio factory could become world's largest chip plant
- devwastaken 5y ago
- nmitchko 5y agoYou might be underestimating the number of people who would return to the workforce for jobs like this.
- et15 5y agoThere are definitely downsides to Ohio - namely, political- and weather-related. However, Columbus is a pretty big tech city with a lot of startups, VC money flowing, and a student pipeline from OSU.
- bufbupa 5y agoCareful, I think your biases are showing. To assert that nobody wants to live in Ohio is an incredibly myopic worldview. I can think of loads of people that would love to work in tech without the big city living, or the high prices that come with it.
- belval 5y agoThis is a bit of a weird take to me. I don't know anything about Ohio (maybe it's a shit hole) but large investment will raise the living standards. California is beautiful, diverse and whatnot, but it's not like there is something in the air that makes it that way. The influx of people and capital is what makes it special. Same for NY and most higher density areas.
- thoughtpalette 5y agoGrowing up in Michigan and moving to Chicago (12 years), I sort of felt the same. Recently visited Cincinnati though and it was kind of amazing. Little town in a "valley", Nice river front, people and shops were nice. Good downtown feeling. Would def consider it a low cost of living place on my radar now.
- BeetleB 5y agoI'm guessing you've never been to Columbus and have little idea on what it's like there. Plenty of people go to top schools in that part of the country for their PhD. If they're willing to spend 5-7 years doing that, I can see them willing to work there. Also, if people moved to the middle of nowhere in New York to work for GF, or Burlington, VT - I think they'll be OK with Columbus.
- MathYouF 5y agoI was born and partially raised in Columbus and Ohio in general. I defintiely left for the coast as soon as I could get a job that allowed it. So there's at least certain people they're describing the motivations of correctly. That said, there are many who are happy to live there. I do wonder how many young and truly brilliant engineers are on that list, but maybe their presence won't be required on site? It's not an exciting place to be young and dynamic when compared to the big cities on the coasts. The quality of life though, especially for someone raising a family and looking to build their nest egg, is great. Fresh air, relatively low crime, nice large yards and people with good Midwestern family values (might not be the "values" someone from San Fransisco would prioritize though).
- ianceicys 5y agoI don't know where you get the idea "anyone in tech desperately tries to leave." I'm on the East Coast currently, but I'd love to move to Ohio. Cost of Living / Work-Life Integration is pretty compelling from several friends I've had who have moved to the Columbus area from Cali in the past 3-4 years for senior tech positions. When 150k achieves a 400k lifestyle from Cali...and you start having a family..it's hard to not to at least pronder the idea. This will be good for the midwest, for intel, and for the United States.
- brewdad 5y agoOhio is the 7th largest state by population and 10th in population density. It's also continuing to grow in population, especially around Columbus, unlike some other Rust Belt states. Whether they "want to" or not, LOTS of people live in Ohio and Columbus is arguably it's most vibrant city thanks to being the capital and home of its flagship university. I'm a UMich grad, so am not allowed to live in Ohio, but I can see its appeal for some.
- theandrewbailey 5y ago> I'm a UMich grad, so am not allowed to live in Ohio, but I can see its appeal for some. You'll get looks if people know you're an alum from that school up north, but you should be OK. Beat Michigan! For those not in the know: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan%E2%80%93Ohio_State_football_rivalry https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michigan%E2%80%93Ohio_State_fo... https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=OSU+cross+out+M&iax=images&ia=images https://duckduckgo.com/?t=ffab&q=OSU+cross+out+M&iax=images&...
- rayusher 5y agoFor a single person yes but if you have family Ohio is a nice place to live. That's why Dave Chappelle's decided to live out there.
- micromacrofoot 5y agoDave Chappelle lives on a 60 acre farm... that's a nice place to live in any state
- steve76 5y ago
- systems_glitch 5y agoDayton Hamfest.
- empthought 5y agoI didn’t expect to see this particular comment, but I’m glad I did.
- dang 5y agoPlease don't take HN threads into regional flamewar, regardless of which region you have a problem with. It's tedious, offtopic, and particularly avoidable. Comments like yours triggered a hellish flamewar elsewhere in this thread—exactly what we don't want here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- keeganjw 5y agoWow, it really takes an insane amount of money these days to make a leading edge fab. I really hope they can pull this off and it doesn't end up like Foxconn in Wisconsin...
- tyleo 5y agoI was thinking that. Im a former Ohioan and most of my family is still here. I have much more faith in Intel than in Foxconn. My understanding is that Foxconn had a shoddy track record of building out locations outside of their home country.
- bushbaba 5y agoFoxconn is hard, repetitive manual labor. chip fab isn’t nearly as bad of work. Americans don’t want crappy jobs which is why foxcon had issues.
- beambot 5y ago"TSMC’s Arizona Culture Clash" - https://www.eetimes.com/tsmcs-arizona-culture-clash/ https://www.eetimes.com/tsmcs-arizona-culture-clash/ > Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) faces challenges managing employees at its new fab in Arizona who are unaccustomed to the long work hours and management culture that in Taiwan have helped make the company the world’s largest chip foundry.
- nurspouse 5y agoHaving worked at Intel, I can tell you that the process side of Intel has similar work hours. This, in particular, rings true for Intel: > Different positions may have different requirements, so work hours vary, according to the principal engineer. “An equipment engineer might start work at 8 o’clock in the morning and leave around 9 o’clock at night, but is it normal? This may happen two or three days a week. On a production line, the equipment must be maintained. > “If you are a process engineer, it will be more stable. Maybe you can start work at 8:30 a.m.and leave before 7:30 p.m. If there are some urgent matters, you may have to stay later.” At Intel, process engineers had to attend a daily meeting at 7:40am (mandatory), and would rarely leave before 6pm (meetings scheduled at 5 or 6pm were common). I sometimes would wander around in that part of the building at 7pm and a significant fraction of cubicles would be filled. Almost all Intel process engineers have PhDs.
- bigbillheck 5y agoI have in-laws in the Columbus area and have visited there several times. You might be able to pay us to live there, but it would have to be 'retire after a year' kind of money. It has all the charm of a strip mall.
- dang 5y agoPlease don't take HN threads into regional flamewar, regardless of which region you have a problem with. It's tedious, offtopic, and particularly avoidable. Comments like yours triggered a hellish flamewar elsewhere in this thread—exactly what we don't want here. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- bee_rider 5y agoGood luck to them! Always nice to get as much semiconducter talent in-country as possible, fabs are a pretty crucial supply line after all. I'd imagine most people would want a pretty significant pay raise to move to somewhere like Ohio, but they are nearby Ohio State University, so maybe they'll get local talent.
- justin66 5y ago> I'd imagine most people would want a pretty significant pay raise to move to somewhere like Ohio Cost of living is low relative to the west coast and high relative to a lot of places in Asia, so it really depends on who you're talking about.
- vmception 5y agoFor now. I’ve travelled to enough cities that it is basically an amusing part of my checklist to hear why Area Man is mad about housing prices going up. I could procedurally generate possible scapegoats at this point.
- justin66 5y agoThe nice thing about where they've located that Intel site, purely in terms of housing cost, is that you can get there quickly from plenty of cheap small towns. I'd live in Columbus if I worked there, but you could certainly go in the other direction without too much of a commute.
- Melatonic 5y ago"Area Man" - love it. Gonna use that from now on.
- TulliusCicero 5y agoRent in Columbus appears to be roughly comparable to Tokyo: https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?country1=Japan&city1=Tokyo&country2=United+States&city2=Columbus%2C+OH&displayCurrency=USD https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/compare_cities.jsp?cou...
- smashem 5y agoExcellent. Hope it works out long-term.
- vavooom 5y ago"largest investment in Ohio's history" "the largest semiconductor manufacturing location on the planet" What is it that makes Ohio such a key and ideal place for such a massive investment? I assume there must be an abundance of energy + work force + land available that makes this possible, as well as a foundation built up by the Rust Belt. Could the Rust Belt go Silicon?
- thehappypm 5y agoOhio has a good mix. It’s in a low cost of living area with a business friendly climate, being economically depressed, Intel gets lots of perks. Workforce is cheaper than elsewhere due to lower COL. There’s lots of water nearby. And, there’s the potential for talent with the many universities in the area.
- titzer 5y agoThat and incredible tax breaks. I'm originally from neighboring Indiana. The midwest should have figured this out long ago, but political corruption, the coal lobby, and a lack of imagination has really blinkered the long-term planning there.
- vgeek 5y agoNew Albany has a lot of corporate headquarters relative to the size of the city, even when you exclude the Les Wexner (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Wexner https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Les_Wexner) companies. Big Lots, Red Roof Inn and Bob Evans are the most prominent, but there are lots of other major companies with measurable presence (one of the two AWS US-EAST-2 DCs & a FB DC), too. From looking at the town's operating plan, The New Albany Company (a planned community, where Wexner & friends have/can buy up all of the swampy farmland they want and grow the city limits as necessary) already have lots of land (both for C&I and residential) and can offer tax breaks/rebates that can't be matched for corporations, instead relying more on the taxes from the residential developments of $500k+ homes (probably 1.5-2x MSA median) in the area (if you want to see a gerrymandered map, look up New Albany-- it is very deliberate in excluding multi-family developments from the city limits).
- 5y ago
- dqpb 5y agoFinally.
- mungoman2 5y agoHow do the economics work here? Intel's market cap is $215B.
- selectodude 5y agoThe market cap of Intel is so low because their cost of growth is so expensive.
- gok 5y agoDebt
- jimbob45 5y agoGratuitous subsidies from the US government. Also this is a great move in my eyes. Intel's HQ is on the West Coast and I imagine that they lose out on at least some portion of East Coast talent as a result. Hopefully this allows them to have the best of both worlds.
- dsr_ 5y agoDesign work doesn't need to be done close to the fab. Intel seems to be effectively splitting into two companies -- a fab company and a design company. I don't think there are two worlds, either, unless you think that LA, SF and Seattle also constitute worlds unto themselves.
- onepointsixC 5y agoThe US gov is seriously under investing compared to it's peers. South Korea is spending nearly 9 times more with their $450Bn pledged gov investment into Semiconductors[0] compared to America's investment of $52Bn with the CHIPS Act[1] [0]: https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Tech/Semiconductors/South-Korea-plans-to-invest-450bn-to-become-chip-powerhouse https://asia.nikkei.com/Business/Tech/Semiconductors/South-K... [1]: https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/2022/01/14/heres-what-you-need-know-chips-act-semiconductor-global-supply-shortage-pandemic/9183398002/ https://www.dispatch.com/story/news/2022/01/14/heres-what-yo...
- deleted 5y ago
- ksec 5y agoIntel said the same thing for Arizona as well. Initial $20B investment which could expand to $100B. So they are building it in two places. I wonder why they dont keep it all in Arizona? ( May be Tax Break, but I have no idea how Tax Break works in US ) And if you include their (expected) expansion in EUR, Intel is layering the foundation for Foundry Services. Compared to its half assed Custom Foundry in 2012/2013 with little to zero CapEx increase. Foundry Services 2.0 is very real. Note: Investor Notes from ASML are also interesting, suggesting Intel may be ahead in terms of High-NA EUV orders. Initial shipment expected in 2023.
- flybrand 5y ago> why not all AZ? Game theory between US states playing to get the most gov’t assistance? Finite pool of talent? Our plants are in rural areas and everyone is struggling to hire, from auto to bakeries.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- missedthecue 5y agoOhio is situated on the great lakes and therefore has a lot of cheaply available water, while Arizona does not. Chip production is water intensive. Not to mention the vast expanses of cheap land, and their electricity costs are pretty low as well. These could be reasons.
- jandrese 5y agoI thought that while chip production uses a lot of water, the water is mostly not consumed in the process and due to environmental regulation the water has to be cleaned at the plant so they form a closed loop system. It takes a lot of water when the plant is built, but after that it requires only a small amount of water to continue running.
- adventured 5y agoIt's political distribution, to be called upon as needed. Same reason NASA is sprawled the way it is. You can more easily get numerous Senators to go to bat for you and your various causes (Arizona is a growth state, Ohio still has a lot of clout (not as much as CA, TX, FL obviously)).
- geenew 5y agoCouldn't find much info on the process size in the Reuters article, but the Intel press release[0] says this: " “The Ohio factories are designed for the ‘Angstrom era,’ with support for Intel’s most advanced process technologies, including Intel 18A." This[1] doesn't give a transistor density for 18A, but the 20A transistor density is greater than the TMSC 3nm, fwiw. [0] https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/intel-announces-next-us-site-landmark-investment-ohio.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/intel-... [1] https://www.anandtech.com/show/16823/intel-accelerated-offensive-process-roadmap-updates-to-10nm-7nm-4nm-3nm-20a-18a-packaging-foundry-emib-foveros https://www.anandtech.com/show/16823/intel-accelerated-offen...
- ksec 5y ago18A is consider as 1.8nm in TSMC terms.
- HPsquared 5y ago1 Å = 0.1 nm, which is roughly the diameter of a hydrogen atom.
- tux3 5y agoThis mandatory comment is your threadly reminder that node names are entirely unrelated to any physical dimensions, as has been the case for many years now. You should not interpret node names as meaning anything more than a point on the semiconductor roadmap. Nodes that share the same names across foundries will not have the same performance characteristics, but are usually roughly comparable (especially since Intel's new naming scheme).
- AlwaysRock 5y ago"Up to $100B". Okay. I planned on spending up to $100B for my wife's Christmas present. I actually ended up spending $75 + tax.
- jeremyjh 5y agoThe initial investment is $20B according to the article.
- deleted 5y ago[deleted]
- sidlls 5y agoThis isn’t very charitable. When companies publish this sort of thing they’re generally committed (however tentatively) to within some reasonable percentage of the amount. Provided of course it makes financial sense after further diligence and the like.
- shoyer 5y agoFoxconn once said it would spend $10B building a factory in Wisconsin. Now the claim is $672M -- over next six years: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn_in_Wisconsin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn_in_Wisconsin We'll believe it when it happens.
- AlwaysRock 5y agoExactly. I'm less charitable because of Foxconn and how that story developed. Big companies promises tons of money and small/mid sized economies will give them huge tax cuts in exchange. In reality they build a much smaller plant and still take the tax cuts.
- Aperocky 5y agoIt's a race to the bottom, once an unspoken rule has been broken it will stay that way forever.
- munificent 5y ago
- benreesman 5y agoI’m for global competition as a force as much as the next thinking person, but as an American who grew up on Intel chips it sure would be nice to not get our asses kicked all over the field for a change. The ASML stuff seems to indicate they might mean it this time.
- ensan 5y agoWhen it comes to proximity research institutions, the choice of location is strange to me. Somewhere in the northern Indiana/Illinois/Michigan (i.e. "Greater Michiana") would have made a lot more sense. That way, you would be close to, UIUC, Northwestern, UChicago, UMichigan, Purdue, Notre Dame, UIndiana, Argonne National Lab, etc.
- lotsofpulp 5y agoDo the people that need to work at the fabs come from those schools?
- datavirtue 5y agoNo. It is unskilled labor save for the jobs that are not on the shop floor.
- ensan 5y agoFor such a high-tech industry, the choice of location is also about taking advantage of the talent and research ecosystem that is already established there.
- rotten 5y agoThe Ohio State University is in Columbus and if not the largest university in the world it is in the top 3.
- randcraw 5y agoYes, but OSU is not especially well known for computer architecture. In comparison, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Illinois are all top-5 schools in EE/hardware. And the Champaign area is even more affordable than Columbus. So choosing Columbus must have satisfied multiple constraints, some of which aren't obvious.
- erosenbe0 5y agoChampaign doesn't have sufficient infrastructure (think construction workers even) so they'd be looking at Chicago suburbs. This would make Labor costs way too high. Wisconsin would be a fantastic choice but Foxconn boondoggle probably ruined that possibility.
- qsmi 5y agoDoes anyone know why Intel would want to build a "mega-site" in the city of Columbus Ohio? Why not choose Cleveland Ohio where one has port access with an existing route to Europe? Fabs are international affairs, no matter where they're rooted, because just to keep the place running one needs a constant stream of parts from everywhere. It seems like being in a sea/rail/truck hub would be a logistics advantage. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_of_Cleveland https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_of_Cleveland Edit: On second thought, Arizona doesn't have port access either so I guess it's not really a significant consideration.
- long_time_gone 5y ago> Does anyone know why Intel would want to build a "mega-site" in the city of Columbus Ohio? My guess would be access to talent and costs. Columbus is more than 2x bigger than Cleveland. Building cars is also an international affair and we see those plants all over the place.
- dtwest 5y agoColumbus metro area is roughly the same size as Cleveland metro area so I don't think that is the reason. However, it could still have a talent advantage. Having OSU nearby is helpful, and maybe it is easier to attract talent to move to a city with a big university.
- HelloMcFly 5y agoColumbus grew 15% in the last decade, Cleveland shrank 6%. That could also have something to do with as there's reason to believe it will continue to attract skilled talent.
- hardolaf 5y agoYou don't need skilled talent to operate fabs. You need people who can go through a 2 year degree program.
- 5y ago
- xyst 5y agoits a shame we didn't see this type of investment after the rust belt area crashed in 2008. if we had more domestic chip plants, we probably wouldn't be in the current chip shortage rn chip fab/manufacturing process probably doesn't generate as many jobs as the auto industry (the process is automated heavily from what I have seen) at its peak but at least they will be very high paying.
- gruez 5y ago>if we had more domestic chip plants, we probably wouldn't be in the current chip shortage rn Why? At the end of the day it's a capacity shortage. The only way to prevent that is to have surplus capacity prior to the pandemic. Considering how companies don't like to spend money on expensive fabs that end up getting underutilized, I'm skeptical that having more domestic chip plants would lead to that.
- cxr 5y ago> The only way to prevent that is to have surplus capacity prior to the pandemic. The only way to prevent that is to have surplus capacity prior to the pandemic. "Capacity" in a fab means throughput. Contrary to the breathlessness that I hear when people describe modern semiconductor manufacturing, fabs are nowhere near optimal. There's plenty of dumb shit that happens in an ordinary day at a semiconductor fab—and consequently, lots of room for (easy) improvements. Fabs have lower than optimal capacity because they go heavy on hiring for things like a background in physics and chemistry, or tangential degrees like aerospace[1], but they don't treat IT concerns or the day-to-day processes that workers are engaged in like engineering problems. This gets you things like routine showstoppers that take 20+ minutes to resolve because that's how long it takes to go turn off the Caps Lock on a given workstation before being able to resume work. So much room for improvement. 1. and proficiency in Microsoft Office https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30021528 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30021528
- davidjytang 5y agoFab is still considered high-risk. It made sense to MBAs that why build your own fab when you can outsource it to someone who is willing to sink all that money and does it well for reasonable price. Until supply chain got choked.
- JaimeThompson 5y agoI have been told, but can't verify, that Intel was looking at placing this in Texas but that the power grid issues ruled that out. Can anyone confirm?
- tommydoesntknow 5y ago
- jet777 5y agoI so wish they would've picked Cleveland over Columbus
- justin66 5y agoI assume the deal with Intel was negotiated by the state government and so Cleveland was never in the running, but it must be said, the City of Cleveland has traditionally had a knack for repelling businesses that are interested in making big moves into the city. Progressive and Eaton both wanted to be headquartered downtown, instead of out in the burbs. An Intel fab in the City of Cleveland proper is something to contemplate, but I doubt very much that it was ever a possibility. You'd probably want to locate such a thing further out in the county.
- WillPostForFood 5y agoManufacturing Jobs Are Never Coming Back https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/manufacturing-jobs-are-never-coming-back/ https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/manufacturing-jobs-are-...
- dmead 5y agothey aren't making tube socks.
- WillPostForFood 5y agoIf you want tube socks manufactured in the US it can be done the same way. Not saying it is good economics, but if the government wants tube sock manufacturing jobs in the US it is trivial to make it happen. If you say "never" or "can't" your are lying, and you really mean you don't want it to happen.
- dodobirdlord 5y agoWhat is the meaning of this comment? Are you highlighting the article title because you think that it’s incorrect in the context of this fab being built? Fabs like this are automated to the greatest extent possible, and the remaining jobs are mostly high-skill. The article makes this point directly. > Here’s the problem: Whether or not those manufacturing jobs could have been saved, they aren’t coming back, at least not most of them. How do we know? Because in recent years, factories have been coming back, but the jobs haven’t. Because of rising wages in China, the need for shorter supply chains and other factors, a small but growing group of companies are shifting production back to the U.S. But the factories they build here are heavily automated, employing a small fraction of the workers they would have a generation ago.
- selimthegrim 5y agoWasn't American Factory set in Dayton?
- gaoshan 5y agoThis is actually a brilliant location for them. One of those places that has much more going for it than people not from the region would realize. International airport, large rail depot, extremely low cost of living and a city/region that has more good restaurants and activities than might be expected. Ohio State University is in the city and is a huge school that is rapidly growing in academic standing. Road transit in the area is also very good allowing access to any part of the city from any other part in rapid fashion. Good schools, relatively low crime, etc. Probably the only drawback, from a lifestyle point of view, would be the winter and that's not even that bad, compared to other winter regions.
- planetsprite 5y agoHowever it's misguided. Cost of labor is still 10x higher than a plant with the same productivity in a relatively poorer country. American manufacturing is mostly indirect social welfare now, it's not economically efficient.
- enkid 5y agoIs cost of labor really one of the major costs of a semiconductor plant? Plants in South Korea and Taiwan are economical and they have relatively high labor costs, so I'm not sure I buy this.
- vizzier 5y agoThis was my thought as well, chip production has to be so necessarily automated to maintain a clean state that it feels like the cost of engineers to maintain systems is always going to be high, but also a small cost of the overall system. I'd love some real numbers.
- pm90 5y agoThe only reason it’s not in China is because they don’t have ready access to the technology that allows for this. All the “fabulous” chip makers in Asia are all US allies.
- 5y ago
- MathCodeLove 5y agoI've actually been considering a move to Ohio this June. Any suggestions for whetr in Ohio I should look? My main consideration is low CoL as I work remotely but I'd like there to be stuff to do within a reasonable driving distance.
- N1H1L 5y agoBoth Columbus and Cincy are great. Cleveland is iffy and too snowy in my opinion
- nickthegreek 5y agoI am very happy in Columbus. I hear Cleveland has better nightlife, but I came from up that way and the snow difference between Columbus and Cleveland is huge. I do not miss it.
- justin66 5y agoHas snowplow service improved at all in Columbus? I was always struck by how bad it was compared to Cleveland. They got less snow, but dealt with the snow they got pretty badly.
- nickthegreek 5y agoI am not sure. WFH keeps me inside most days and we have barely had any snow this year.
- sfotm 5y agoI'm an Ohio native that's recently moved back to the Columbus area myself. I know the area pretty intimately. Happy to respond to any questions about the area, as I'd love for there to be a larger tech scene around here.
- 3825 5y agoTwo questions, does the area have symmetric gigabit fiber? If so, how reliable is it in your opinion? If not, what is the best option for multiple family members working from home? How are water, electricity, sewage, road condition, utilities situation? Any reasons why a work from home worker might not want to live there?
- nabla9 5y agoOne fab will use 12 high-NA EUV machines from ASML and their price will be "well over $340 million". They will be spending more than $4B per fab just for for ASML machines. https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/01/intel-says-ohio-megafab-will-begin-making-advanced-chips-in-2025/ https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2022/01/intel-says-ohio-...
- markl42 5y ago
- dang 5y agoComments like this are egregiously against the site guidelines. We ban accounts that post like that, so please don't. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
- micromacrofoot 5y agoI wonder if big workforce investments like this in states like Ohio and Texas will eventually impact political leanings in the immediate area... will be interesting to see if anything's changed 10 years in
- hardolaf 5y agoThese are mostly blue-collar/striped-blue-and-white-collar jobs. So no, not really. Fabs are also giant ecological disasters. I wouldn't be surprised if Columbus was chosen over Cleveland because the different rules the Ohio EPA has based on localized pollution.
- erik_seaberg 5y ago> Fabs are also giant ecological disasters. Is that still true? I thought they cut a lot of corners in the pre-Superfund era, but are watched more closely now.
- hardolaf 5y agoYeah. They still pollute like crazy. Not as bad as the old days, but they're still extremely bad for the local environment.
- theandrewbailey 5y ago> An initial $20 billion investment - the largest in Ohio's history - on a 1,000-acre site in New Albany will create 3,000 jobs I grew up just north of there. An Intel factory nearby would be good news for anyone in the rust belt. I hope this doesn't fizzle out like Wisconsin's Foxconn plant.
- 55873445216111 5y agoThere are always unknowns, but Intel is a much more reliable partner than Foxconn. The Wisconsin Foxconn deal smelled very fishy from day 1 IMO.
- sanp 5y ago
- 535188B17C93743 5y ago
- rotten 5y agoThis same street has a Facebook data center, an AWS data center, and a Google data center (within a couple of miles). There is a biotech research campus, Bath & Bodyworks main research lab, and the main operations center for AEP (a midwest electric company). If you travel about 2-3 miles orthogonal to that street we have a big data center for Nationwide Insurance, a campus for Discover (credit cards), and a State Farm insurance facility. It is literally across street from one of the Ohio East-2 availability zones. If they were making rack-mounted server boards, they could just walk them across the street and plug them into the cloud.
- sanchay 5y agoThat's why I come to HN, would have been oblivious to the fact otherwise
- afandian 5y agoMe too, but I'm reasonably sure this is information I will never use.
- MisterPea 5y agoExactly what I was going to say. "Friends don't let friends use us-east-1" - us-east-2 will be a huge spot for computing in the coming decade.
- chasd00 5y ago> This same street has a Facebook data center, an AWS data center, and a Google data center (within a couple of miles). There is a biotech research campus, *Bath & Bodyworks main research lab*, and the main operations center for AEP (a midwest electric company). i bet it would be fun to chat and talk shop with engineers at the bath and body works lab during a lunch.
- rotten 5y agoThey regularly dump batches of perfume into the air - you can smell it for miles. It probably confuses pollinators and other wildlife because the smells are so intense.
- neonate 5y agohttps://archive.is/66jAS https://archive.is/66jAS
- supernova87a 5y agoIs it true that once such a plant is built, the number of skilled workers to keep it running is actually relatively low? I.e. some operational "dev-ops" style engineers who can fix and troubleshoot highly automated lines, keep the thing running. People to supervise the systems, some workers to handle raw materials, etc. and then the packaging on the output side. But in general, quite sparse for a million square foot property, compared to other industries occupying a building of that size? I wonder partly because the favorable tax / labor jurisdictions aren't exactly where you tend to find extremely skilled silicon engineers. But an operational plant is maybe not where those folks are needed.
- adamcstephens 5y agoThey’re touting this project as 3k permanent employees.
- Shadonototra 5y ago[flagged]
- ineedasername 5y agoWith all of this recent chip investment, would anyone with more familiarity with the industry care to comment about how much this is driven by: 1) pre-existing long term plans 2) more recent supply chain bottlenecks 3) Some combination of 1 & 2 Bonus: How China may figure into the equation
- thanatos519 5y agoOddly, my mental autocomplete filled in 'white elephant' before the parser got to 'chip plant'.
- 11thEarlOfMar 5y agoBigger than these 5 monstrosities? http://shorturl.at/yHLW2 http://shorturl.at/yHLW2
- piceas 5y agoA Google Maps link to the Kioxia Yokkaichi Plant
- ericmay 5y agoReally disappointed in many of the negative and insecure comments coming from members of this community saying “Ohio sucks” or “Ohio State University sucks because it’s not Stanford” or “how many startups does Ohio have”. It really reflects poorly on those making these comments and I can’t help but think seeing a state not on the east or west coast being selected is causing fear and uncertainty in the lives of those who wrap up their personality in being in California or something. People in Ohio are excited about this and all of the negativity, frankly, is just unwelcome. Think the Midwest and Ohio suck because there aren’t mountains or an ocean? What good is any of that from behind your keyboard with the A/C on or sitting on your couch watching the same Netflix special as everyone else? Meanwhile in 5 hours I can be on your beach and enjoying all the best parts of where you live with 0 downside. Think Ohio State sucks? Right because Stanford has always been a top 5 university from day one and everything is static forever. Intel employs “low skill people and they’re not startup software engineering jobs” ok? What actual value does your privacy-evading ad tech addiction company add over honest people who just want a job making actual things? I guess Tesla employs low skill people in Austin at the Gigafactory too? Don’t like Ohio? Good we don’t care. You don’t have to live here and we have never needed to care about your opinion. You don’t have a monopoly on talent or anything else except maybe people who think that because their license plate says something different that somehow they’re better than us. Seriously grow up. -edit- It’s not just comments here. Here’s one out in the wild: https://twitter.com/terronk/status/1484599015828176898?s=21 https://twitter.com/terronk/status/1484599015828176898?s=21 Piss off. And you know what? For all those comments “blah blah there’s only family to move there for” like yea. Exactly. Maybe you should too. I don’t have to get my social life from doomscrolling on Facebook and making myself depressed. I actually have friends and family that I see everyday and can count on. We cook meals together and help each other. We play board games, celebrate birthdays, and like being near each other. These social media apps are filling a void that you created for yourself. I like visiting California and can live there if I want to. I choose my family and friends. Maybe you should too and get off your holier-than-thou attitude.
- shroompasta 5y agoI may be wrong, but I'm assuming one of the cardinal factors in the location came down to the cheapest labor they could find. Competing with labor, in terms of willingness to work for a low wage, against Asia is next to impossible for these fabs.
- analog31 5y agoSincere question: How polluting are fabs? When I read "access to water," it scares me.
- totalZero 5y agoVery. First, any facility that uses reverse osmosis to purify/recycle water is left with concentrated impurities in the form of brine. Second, there are all sorts of nasty chemicals used in chip fabrication. There are several Superfund sites where chips were once made. https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/09/silicon-valley-full-superfund-sites/598531/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/09/silic...
- bhewes 5y agoThis is the kind of manufacturing the Midwest needs.
- stakkur 5y agoIt’s because of water access, and Ohio basically bent over backwards to give Intel anything they wanted, included long-term sabotage of its own tax base in exchange for promises of jobs and other benefits. Ohio was the lowest, most pliant bidder.
- syspec 5y agoIs this going by the size of the employees or the square footage?
- 1970-01-01 5y agoIf its anywhere near Cleveland, the CPU codename writes itself: Alder Lake Sky Lake Kaby Lake Mistake Lake :)
- selimthegrim 5y agoYou forgot Turkeyfoot Lake (but that would be Akron)
- stjohnswarts 5y agoThis is great news. Letting China/Taiwan be the one stop shop for everything is going to be a big mistake in the next decade or two, it also reflects badly on the USA that we are completely dependent on a foreign power as much as we are. The current market has show that it won't price in externalities such as future wars (and cold wars) and only government pushes here and there will help it along. Intel is seeing the potential for that I believe, given the shortages and such. They certainly have the expertise to make these other types of chips that the US market has all but given up on. I think the big thing is we need to at least have the equivalent capability to what we are getting from Taiwan because it has become clear that China is not going to allow them to be independent for much longer, particularly under Xi.
- zahma 5y agoI’m excited by this news for two reasons. I hope it bodes well for macro-economic political policies to bring well-paid jobs back to the US. I’m also optimistic that this will inspire other companies (ie Apple) to double down on their CSR commitments and invest more into domestic manufacturing.