Intel is to build a $4.6bn semiconductor assembly and testing plant in Poland, as the US chipmaker bets that Berlin will yield to its demands for more subsidies in relation to a planned manufacturing facility across the border in Germany.
The plant in Wroclaw will help meet “critical demand for assembly and test capacity” that Intel says it expects to be ready by 2027. That is also when its €17bn wafer manufacturing facility in the German city of Magdeburg is expected to be up and running.
But the US chipmaker has, since announcing its German plans last year, launched into tough negotiations with Berlin, arguing that inflation and higher energy costs have rendered the €6.8bn in subsidies that the government originally pledged for the project insufficient.