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US President Biden has awarded $504 million to a dozen select "Tech Hubs" in different states across the country as part of his 2022 Chips Act funding, the White House announced Tuesday.
"These Tech Hubs will give regions across our nation the resources and opportunities necessary to lead in the economy of tomorrow while creating good-paying jobs for American workers," Vice President Kamala Harris said in a statement.
These dozen Tech Hubs are just under half of all the hubs nationally that Biden designated last year. This smaller group out of the 31 in total has been chosen to receive additional funding due to their locations and scope of work.
The funding will be split across the 12 hubs, each of which are conducting different types of tech research and production. South Florida's Tech Hub is focused on engineering climate change-resistant infrastructure, for example. In Ohio, researchers will work on building sustainable polymers which could potentially lessen humanity's reliance on rubber and fossil fuel-based plastics.
The Tech Hubs in Wisconsin, Indiana, and New Hampshire are focused on healthcare, the Oklahoma hub will focused on autonomous solutions, and the South Carolina hub will work on clean energy supply chain solutions. Nevada is building a lithium lifecycle cluster with its funds, and New York state is looking to improve its chip manufacturing industry.
In Colorado, the Tech Hub will develop quantum computing research for AI, climate change, and medical applications. In Montana, the Tech Hub will fund photonic remote sensor research.
The White House emphasized in its announcement that these tech hubs are not being developed in high-income, economically developed areas. Instead, they're avoiding places like Silicon Valley so that more Americans across the country can benefit from or take part in important scientific work.
Biden's Chips and Science Act has set aside billions in funding with the goal of spurring US job growth and scientific development in the tech sector. Specifically, Biden's administration has repeatedly emphasized a desire for the US to become a leading producer and manufacturer of advanced semiconductor chips. The US has awarded Samsung $6.4 billion, Intel $8.5 billion, TSMC $11.6 billion, and Micron $6.1 billion in grants and loans to turn the US into a global chip-making power.