Silicon Box, a global leader in advanced semiconductor packaging and system integration, welcomes the European Commission's approval of approximately €1.3 billion for its new manufacturing facility in Italy. The project, representing a total investment of €3.2 billion, will create 1,600 high-skilled jobs and establish Europe's most advanced semiconductor packaging facilities.

The investment supports the EU's strategic goal to produce 20% of the world's semiconductors by 2030 and marks Silicon Box's first expansion beyond Singapore. With its proprietary large format panel-level process lines, the factory can scale up the packaging of chips 6 to 8 times more than traditional wafer-level packaging.

The U.S. Department of Commerce will award GlobalWafers America and MEMC, LLC, U.S. subsidiaries of Taiwan-based GlobalWafers Co., Ltd., up to $406 million in direct funding under the CHIPS Incentives Program's Funding Opportunity for Commercial Fabrication Facilities.

The award will support planned investments of $4 billion in advanced semiconductor wafer manufacturing facilities in Sherman, Texas and St. Peters, Missouri. The Department will disburse the funds based on GWA's and MEMC's completion of project milestones over a multi-year timeframe.

Databricks, the Data and AI company, today announced its Series J funding. The company is raising $10 billion of expected non-dilutive financing and has completed $8.6 billion to date. This funding values Databricks at $62 billion and is led by Thrive Capital. Along with Thrive, the round is co-led by Andreessen Horowitz, DST Global, GIC, Insight Partners and WCM Investment Management. Other significant participants include existing investor Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan and new investors ICONIQ Growth, MGX, Sands Capital and Wellington Management.

The company has seen increased momentum and accelerated growth (over 60% year-over-year) in recent quarters largely due to the unprecedented interest in artificial intelligence. To satisfy customer demand, Databricks intends to invest this capital towards new AI products, acquisitions, and significant expansion of its international go-to-market operations. In addition to fueling its growth, this capital is expected to be used towards providing liquidity for current and former employees, as well as pay related taxes. Finally, this quarter marks the first time the company is expected to achieve positive free cash flow.

The Biden-Harris Administration has given Micron Technology up to $6.165 billion in direct funds through the CHIPS Incentives Program to back the company's manufacturing growth. The money will allow Micron to execute its plan announced in October 2022 by investing about $100 billion into Clay, New York fab, and $25 billion into Idaho over 20 years aiming to boost the United States' advanced memory manufacturing from under 2% to around 10% by 2035. This large investment aims to make the U.S. economy stronger by creating a home supply of cutting-edge DRAM chips, moreover it is expected to create approximately 20,000 job across the U.S. Micron plans to spend about $50 billion before 2030 focusing on making more advanced memory semiconductor technology.

Also, the Department of Commerce has put pen to paper on a first draft of terms with Micron. This could lead to funding of up to $275 million to upgrade its Manassas, Virginia plant. The $2 billion investment project aims to bring Micron's 1-alpha technology back to U.S. The 1-alpha process was launched in 2021 and is used for the latest LPDDR5 DRAM chips. This would boost monthly wafer production and create over 400 factory jobs. At its busiest, the project could generate up to 2,700 jobs in the local area.

Santa Clara, CA: Tenstorrent is announcing that it has closed over $693M in its Series D funding round at a pre-money valuation of $2B. Samsung Securities and AFW Partners led the round, which was oversubscribed due to strong demand from investors. Samsung and AFW both have deep relationships with Tenstorrent, and a strong history of investing in pioneering technology companies.

In addition to the leads, many notable investors joined the round including XTX Markets, Corner Capital, MESH, Export Development Canada, Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan, LG Electronics, Hyundai Motor Group, Fidelity, Baillie Gifford, Bezos Expeditions, and more.

Germany is set to invest €2 billion in the semiconductor industry after recent setbacks, according to TrendForce via Liberty Times citing Bloomberg. The German government's new funding is in response to the chip sector's problems, including Intel's delay of the Magdeburg factory and global disruptions in the semiconductor supply chain. The investment will support 10 to 15 projects from wafer production to microchip assembly to strengthen Germany's and Europe's microelectronics ecosystem. This is in line with the European Chips Act which aims to increase the EU's global production capacity to 20% by 2030.

Intel's €30 billion Magdeburg factory delay and other cancelled chip projects from Wolfspeed and ZF Friedrichshafen AG have created uncertainty in the German market. The Ministry of Economic Affairs is now calling for new applications for funding, with up to €3 billion available. The timing of the semiconductor investment follows the global supply chain disruptions caused by the pandemic and the increasing geopolitical tensions between the US, China and Taiwan. Germany is following a broader trend of governments investing in local semiconductor production to increase technological independence and economic resilience. The funding is subject to budget reallocation with the new government after February 2025 elections. In the first round of subsidies from the European Chips Act, Germany allocated resources to two key initiatives: Intel's investment and a collaborative project between Infineon and TSMC in Dresden.

GlobalFoundries faces a $500,000 fine from the US Commerce Department for breaching export controls by shipping $17.1 million worth of chips to SJ Semiconductor (SJS), a blacklisted Chinese firm affiliated with Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC). The company made 74 unauthorized shipments between February 2021 and October 2022, delivering nearly 5,700 wafers. The chipmaker attributed the violation to a data entry error in its Oracle trade management system, where SJS was incorrectly recorded under a direct customer's shipping details. While SJS had previously handled GlobalFoundries' chips as a third-party assembly provider, both SJS and SMIC were placed on the Entity List in 2020 due to suspected military ties.

GlobalFoundries received a significantly reduced fine due to its voluntary disclosure and cooperation avoiding a potential fine of up to $34.2 million. "GlobalFoundries' voluntary self-disclosure (VSD) and extensive cooperation throughout the investigation resulted in a significant reduction in the monetary penalty, which is the main incentive of our VSD policies," said John Sonderman, director of the Office of Export Enforcement (OEE) within the Commerce Department. The incident comes as the company anticipates $1.5 billion in CHIPS Act funding for manufacturing expansion. For comparison, the department previously fined Seagate $300 million in April 2023 for shipping $1.1 billion worth of drives to Huawei.

Intel's recent financial woes have brought the company into severe cost-cutting measures, including job cuts and project delays. However, a silver lining remains—Intel is reportedly in the final stages of securing $8.5 billion in direct funding from the US government under the CHIPS Act, delivered by the end of the year. The potential financing comes at a crucial time for Intel, which has been grappling with financial challenges. The company reported a $1.6 billion loss in the second quarter of 2024, leading to short-term setbacks. However, thanks to sources close to the Financial Times, we learn that Intel's funding target will represent the CHIPS Act's largest share, leading to a massive boost to US-based semiconductor manufacturing.

Looking ahead, the potential CHIPS Act funding could serve as a catalyst for Intel's resurgence, reassuring both investors and customers about the company's future. A key element of Intel's recovery strategy lies in the ramp-up of production for its advanced 18A node, which should become the primary revenue driver for its foundry unit. This advancement, coupled with the anticipated government backing, positions Intel to potentially capture market share from established players like TSMC and Samsung. The company has already secured high-profile customers such as Amazon and (allegedly) Broadcom, hinting at its growing appeal in the foundry space. Moreover, Intel's enhanced domestic manufacturing capabilities align well with potential US government mandates for companies like NVIDIA and Apple to produce processors locally, a consideration driven by escalating geopolitical tensions.

The $8.5 billion in CHIPS Act assistance intended for Intel from the US government is expected to be delayed due to the company's ongoing financial struggles. According to a Bloomberg report, the Department of Commerce rejected the initial allocation request, requiring Intel to meet specific objectives and complete a comprehensive due diligence process before the funds are released.

Intel has committed to remaining engaged in discussions despite the additional requirements, though it encountered regulatory and timing challenges. The terms of the funding include $8.5 billion in direct assistance to Intel, along with $11 billion in low-cost credit, and a 25 percent tax credit worth up to $100 billion for Intel's investments in Arizona, New Mexico, Ohio, and Oregon.

Texas Instruments (TI) (Nasdaq: TXN) and the U.S. Department of Commerce have signed a non-binding Preliminary Memorandum of Terms for up to $1.6 billion in proposed direct funding under the CHIPS and Science Act to support three 300 mm wafer fabs already under construction in Texas and Utah. In addition, TI expects to receive an estimated $6 billion to $8 billion from the U.S. Department of Treasury's Investment Tax Credit for qualified U.S. manufacturing investments. The proposed direct funding, coupled with the investment tax credit, would help TI provide a geopolitically dependable supply of essential analog and embedded processing semiconductors.

"The historic CHIPS Act is enabling more semiconductor manufacturing capacity in the U.S., making the semiconductor ecosystem stronger and more resilient," said Haviv Ilan, president and CEO of Texas Instruments. "Our investments further strengthen our competitive advantage in manufacturing and technology as we expand our 300 mm manufacturing operations in the U.S. With plans to grow our internal manufacturing to more than 95% by 2030, we're building geopolitically dependable, 300 mm capacity at scale to provide the analog and embedded processing chips our customers will need for years to come."

Micron Technology, Inc., one of the world's largest semiconductor companies and the only U.S.-based manufacturer of memory, and the Biden-Harris Administration today announced that they have signed a non-binding Preliminary Memorandum of Terms (PMT) for $6.1 billion in funding under the CHIPS and Science Act to support planned leading-edge memory manufacturing in Idaho and New York.

The CHIPS and Science Act grants of $6.1 billion will support Micron's plans to invest approximately $50 billion in gross capex for U.S. domestic leading-edge memory manufacturing through 2030. These grants and additional state and local incentives will support the construction of one leading-edge memory manufacturing fab to be co-located with the company's existing leading-edge R&D facility in Boise, Idaho and the construction of two leading-edge memory fabs in Clay, New York.

Playtron is new a startup company put together by Kirt McMaster—former CEO plus co-founder of CyanogenMod—and a couple of industry veterans. Sean Hollister, senior editor and founding member of The Verge, has gained exclusive access to early Playtron material. The firm's logically named PlaytronOS is a Linux-based platform, compatible with ARM and x86 architectures—according to official hype material it is a "light weight gaming OS optimized for a new generation of powerful handheld gaming PCs… and beyond. Play all your games from every store… Steam… Epic and more." Hollister indicated that he was "cautiously optimistic" about Playtron's future prospects, following discussions conducted with development partners, and rifling through internal project documentation.

The Verge report stated that: "Playtron is coming out of stealth with $10 million in funding, roughly 18 employees, and a plan to challenge Microsoft, Valve, and Apple for the next hundred million gamers." The startup has presented lofty ambitions—their operating system (currently in Alpha) is said to run on all of the available mainstream portable gaming platforms. By the end of 2024: "you will...be able to install Playtron on your favorite handheld PC for the best gaming experience ever." McMaster and his colleagues are preparing "native devices" for an estimated launch in 2025—The Verge's exclusive coverage features an official mock-up of a 5G-enabled alternative to Valve's popular Steam Deck family.

The characters in a Lovecraft story are susceptible to… mutation. Minds and bodies are forever altered by exposure to the horrors hiding in the darker corners of the world. It's perhaps no surprise, then, that The Sinking City 2—which just got a world premiere in the latest Xbox Partner Preview broadcast—has undergone its own unexpected change. Where the first game was a detective adventure, with horror bubbling up from its flooded world, its sequel has taken on a darker, more aggressive form. The Sinking City 2 is a true horror game now, with more emphasis on combat, while keeping a Lovecraftian narrative close to its twisted heart.

"The Sinking City is one of our most successful titles, because of our stronger horror genre leanings and the setting," Frogwares Head of Publishing, Sergey Oganesyan tells me. "For us, it was kind of a breakthrough, and we are super excited to work on a full-scale horror game. We have created quite a few detective adventures in the past, so now we're going to mix things up to keep doing what people love from us - meaning story-rich experiences - while still being able to evolve."

The U.S. Department of Commerce today announced $1.5 billion in planned direct funding for GlobalFoundries (Nasdaq: GFS) (GF) as part of the U.S. CHIPS and Science Act. This investment will enable GF to expand and create new manufacturing capacity and capabilities to securely produce more essential chips for automotive, IoT, aerospace, defense, and other vital markets.

New York-headquartered GF, celebrating its 15th year of operations, is the only U.S.-based pure play foundry with a global manufacturing footprint including facilities in the U.S., Europe, and Singapore. GF is the first semiconductor pure play foundry to receive a major award (over $1.5 billion) from the CHIPS and Science Act, designed to strengthen American semiconductor manufacturing, supply chains and national security. The proposed funding will support three GF projects:

According to a Bloomberg report, Intel is seeking to raise at least $2 billion in equity funding from investors for expanding its fabrication facility in Leixlip, Ireland, known as Fab 34. The chipmaker has hired an advisor to find potential investors interested in providing capital for the project. Fab 34 is currently Intel's only chip plant in Europe that uses cutting-edge extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography. It produces processors on the Intel 4 process node, including compute tiles for Meteor Lake client CPUs and expected future Xeon data center chips. While $2 billion alone cannot finance the construction of an entirely new fab today, it can support meaningful expansion or upgrades of existing capacity. Intel likely aims to grow Fab 34's output and/or transition it to more advanced 3 nm-class technologies like Intel 3, Intel 20A, or Intel 18A.

Expanding production aligns with Intel's needs for its own products and its Intel Foundry Services business, providing contract manufacturing. Intel previously secured a $15 billion investment from Brookfield Infrastructure for its Arizona fabs in exchange for a 49% stake, demonstrating the company's willingness to partner to raise capital for manufacturing projects. The Brookfield deal also set a precedent of using outside financing to supplement Intel's own spending budget. It provided $15 billion in effectively free cash flow Intel can redirect to other priorities like new fabs without increasing debt. Intel's latest fundraising efforts for the Ireland site follow a similar equity investment model that leverages outside capital to support its manufacturing expansion plans. Acquiring High-NA EUV machinery for manufacturing is costly, as these machines can reach up to $380 million alone.

Yesterday, the U.S. Department of Commerce publicly announced two new notices of intent—as reported by Tom's Hardware, this involves the latest distributions from the CHIPS Act's $11 billion R&D budget: "$300 million is to be made available across multiple awards of up to $100 million (not including voluntary co-investment) for research on advanced packaging, while another $200 million (or more) is set aside to create the CHIPS Manufacturing USA Institute. Companies will have to compete for the funds by filing an application." The Act's primary $39 billion tranche is designated to new construction endeavors, e.g. the founding of manufacturing facilities.

A grand total of $52 billion was set aside for the CHIPS Act in 2022, which immediately attracted the attention of several semiconductor industry giants. Companies with headquarters outside of North America were allowed to send in applications. Last year, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger, made some controversial statements regarding his company's worthiness of government funding. In his opinion, Team Blue is due the "lion's share" due to his operation being a USA firm—the likes of TSMC and Samsung are far less deserving of subsidies.

GlobalFoundries (GF) announced today it has applied for U.S. CHIPS and Science Act Funding, with two full applications submitted to the CHIPS Program Office of the U.S. Department of Commerce. The submitted applications are for capacity expansion and modernization of GF's U.S. manufacturing facilities.

"As the leading manufacturer of essential semiconductors for the U.S. government, and a vital supplier to the automotive, aerospace and defense, IoT and other markets, GF has submitted our applications to the CHIPS Program Office to participate in the federal grants and investment tax credits enabled by the U.S. CHIPS and Science Act," said Steven Grasso, senior director of global government affairs at GF. "This federal support is critical for GF to continue growing its U.S. manufacturing footprint, strengthening U.S economic security, supply chain resiliency, and national defense."

d-Matrix, the leader in high-efficiency generative AI compute for data centers, has closed $110 million in a Series-B funding round led by Singapore-based global investment firm Temasek. The goal of the fundraise is to enable d-Matrix to begin commercializing Corsair, the world's first Digital-In Memory Compute (DIMC), chiplet-based inference compute platform, after the successful launches of its prior Nighthawk, Jayhawk-I and Jayhawk II chiplets.

d-Matrix's recent silicon announcement, Jayhawk II, is the latest example of how the company is working to fundamentally change the physics of memory-bound compute workloads common in generative AI and large language model (LLM) applications. With the explosion of this revolutionary technology over the past nine months, there has never been a greater need to overcome the memory bottleneck and current technology approaches that limit performance and drive up AI compute costs.

According to Reuters, Micron has followed in Intel's footsteps and asked the US Government to pitch in to help the company build new fabs in Boise, Idaho and Clay, New York. The funds would be part of the CHIPS Act, which means Intel is going to have to fight for its share, since Pat Gelsinger is expecting Intel to get a bigger share than other companies. However, as Micron is also a US company, Intel will have less clout to convince politicians to favour it over the competition for the funds. The CHIPS Act has earmarked US$52.7 billion in subsidiaries for semiconductor production and research in the US.

Last September, Micron announced that it would be investing some US$15 billion in new facilities at its Idaho location by 2032, which the company claimed would create some 17,000 jobs by 2030 in the area. In October, the company went on to state that it would invest up to US$100 billion for the next 20 years in what Micron says will be the largest semiconductor production plant in the world at its Clay, New York location. However, now it looks like at least a sizable chunk of that money will come from the US taxpayers, rather than from Micron's own pocket. Time will tell how much each of the CHIPS Act applications will get, as if enough companies apply, the money might not go quite as far as some of these companies have hoped for.

According to a report published by Bloomberg, the German government has formed plans to create €20 billion ($22 billion) of investments to aid in the growth of local semiconductor manufacturing. The article proposes that the organization is racing to bolster the country's technology sector, and is attempting to secure essential supplies of components. Various geopolitical issues have complicated matters in recent times. Funding will be made available to German and international companies, from Germany's (now diversified) Climate and Transformation reserve, over the next four years. The finance ministry responded to Bloomberg's query, and stated: "The draft for the economic plan 2024 and the financial plan until 2027 for the Climate and Transformation Fund are currently being prepared...This process has not yet been completed." Germany's economy ministry did not provide a statement/response to Bloomberg's queries.

Around 75% of the fund is reportedly set aside for multinational semiconductor firms including Intel Corporation (USA) and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC). Bloomberg believes that Team Blue is due an allocation of €10 billion for investments in its new production facility, located close to Magdeburg, Germany. The government is allegedly deep into talks with TSMC regarding the foundation of a proposed €10 billion production base in the Dresden area—the likes of BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Volkswagen AG would benefit greatly with quicker access to (localized) microcontrollers manufacturing facilities. The government could subsidize half of that total investment (€5 billion). Infineon is possibly in line to receive a €1 billion aid package, since it is building a new fab location in Dresden.

The US government yesterday revealed its $42.45 billion Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) funding program that will aim to deliver reliable, affordable high-speed internet to everyone in the nation by 2030—including all fifty states and US territories. Evidently parts of the country are lacking in terms of online access infrastructure—the briefing room statement outlines some of these issues: "High-speed internet is no longer a luxury - it is necessary for Americans to do their jobs, to participate equally in school, access health care, and to stay connected with family and friends. Yet, more than 8.5 million households and small businesses are in areas where there is no high-speed internet infrastructure, and millions more struggle with limited or unreliable internet options."

The initiative is said to be "the largest internet funding announcement in history," and the White House is readying packages valued from $27 million to $3.3 billion—White House said that it'll award sums of (starting at) $27 million going up to a maximum $3.3 billion, based on the required level of upgrades for a given state/territory. Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Communication and Information Alan Davidson stated: "This is a watershed moment for millions of people across America who lack access to a high-speed Internet connection. Access to Internet service is necessary for work, education, healthcare, and more...States can now plan their Internet access grant programs with confidence and engage with communities to ensure this money is spent where it is most needed."

We are pleased to announce that we have raised $450 million in Series C funding led by Spark Capital with participation from Google, Salesforce Ventures, Sound Ventures, Zoom Ventures, and others. The funding will support our continued work developing helpful, harmless, and honest AI systems—including Claude, an AI assistant that can perform a wide variety of conversational and text processing tasks.

Anthropic was founded to build AI products that people can rely on and generate research about the opportunities and risks of AI. Our CEO, Dario Amodei, says, "We are thrilled that these leading investors and technology companies are supporting Anthropic's mission: AI research and products that put safety at the frontier. The systems we are building are being designed to provide reliable AI services that can positively impact businesses and consumers now and in the future."

Reykjavík, Iceland - 21 March 2023 - CCP Games, creators of sci-fi spacefaring MMO EVE Online, announced today that $40M in financing has been secured from external partners. This financing will allow CCP Games to build upon the discoveries of its research & development team to enable the full-scale development of a new AAA title utilizing blockchain technology, set within the EVE Universe.

"Since its inception, CCP Games' vision has been to create virtual worlds more meaningful than real life. Now, with advancements made within blockchain, we can forge a new universe deeply imbued with our expertise in player agency and autonomy, empowering players to engage in new ways. This financing has marked an exciting frontier in our studio history as we begin our third decade of virtual world operations. We are humbled by the confidence from our partners in the development of this new title," said CCP Games CEO, Hilmar V. Pétursson.

The Biden-Harris Administration through the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Institute of Standards and Technology today launched the first CHIPS for America funding opportunity for manufacturing incentives to restore U.S. leadership in semiconductor manufacturing, support good-paying jobs across the semiconductor supply chain, and advance U.S. economic and national security.

As part of the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act, the Department of Commerce is overseeing $50 billion to revitalize the U.S. semiconductor industry, including $39 billion in semiconductor incentives. The first funding opportunity seeks applications for projects to construct, expand, or modernize commercial facilities for the production of leading-edge, current-generation, and mature-node semiconductors. This includes both front-end wafer fabrication and back-end packaging. The Department will also be releasing a funding opportunity for semiconductor materials and equipment facilities in the late spring, and one for research and development facilities in the fall.

Eliyan Corporation, credited for the invention of the semiconductor industry's highest-performance and most efficient chiplet interconnect, today announced two major milestones in the commercialization of its technology for multi-die chiplet integration: the close of its Series A $40M funding round, and the successful tapeout of its technology on an industry standard 5-nanometer (nm) process.

Eliyan's NuLink PHY and NuGear technologies address the critical need for a commercially viable approach to enabling high performance and cost-effectiveness in the connection of homogeneous and heterogenous architectures on a standard, organic chip substrate. It has proven to achieve similar bandwidth, power efficiency, and latency as die-to-die implementations using advanced packaging technologies, but without the other drawbacks of specialized approaches.