Micron, the company behind the Crucial RAM brand, plans on investing $40 billion over the next decade to build leading-edge memory manufacturing facilities in the US.
The company made the announcement ahead of President Biden signing the $280 billion CHIPS and Science Act into law on Tuesday. The legislation includes $52.7 billion in funding to bolster US manufacturing in semiconductors, a portion of which Micron anticipates receiving.
"This legislation will enable Micron to grow domestic production of memory from less than 2% to up to 10% of the global market in the next decade, making the US home to the most advanced memory manufacturing and R&D in the world,” Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra said on Monday.
Idaho-based Micron plans on sharing more details about the manufacturing facilities in the coming weeks. But the investment will take place over “multiple phases” in the US. Production at the upcoming factories is slated to begin in the second half of this decade.
According to Micron, the new facilities will create up to 40,000 jobs in the US, although it’s unclear how many of these are temporary construction roles. But the company did say the facilities will end up creating about 5,000 highly paid technical and operational roles at Micron.
Micron produces DRAM and NAND flash for products including PCs, graphics cards, smartphones, and USB flash drives. In October, the company announced it planned on spending over $150 billion in global manufacturing and R&D. But at the time, Micron only said the investment might include the US.
The company already has two US manufacturing sites in Boise, Idaho, and Manassas, Virginia. But the bulk of the vendor’s remaining factories are located in Asia, including Japan, Malaysia, Taiwan, Singapore, and China.
It's unclear what the new factories will be manufacturing. But the company added: “Micron’s domestic leading-edge manufacturing capabilities will ensure US national security and supply chain resilience as demand for memory grows in critical market segments like automotive and data center, fueled by accelerating adoption of artificial intelligence and 5G.”