Micron Technology has been selected to receive up to $6.14 billion in CHIPS and Science Act funding from the federal government. The Boise, Idaho-based tech firm says it will use the funds to construct four new fabrication plants — two in its hometown and two in New York State. Micron has committed an investment of up to $125 billion across both states over the next two decades as it endeavors to build a leading-edge memory manufacturing ecosystem. President Biden announced the preliminary funding agreement during a trip to the Milton J. Rubenstein Museum of Science & Technology in Syracuse, New York. Continue reading Micron Awarded CHIPS Funds for Fabs in Idaho and New York

A slump in PC sales and crashing cryptocurrency markets appear to be tempering a demand for semiconductors spurred by COVID-19 era supply chain shortages. Inflation is another mitigating factor, as sales of laptops and high-end GPUs for gaming and cryptocurrency mining slacken. Research firm Gartner predicts global PC shipments will contract by 9.5 percent in 2022, with consumer demand projected to decline by 13.5 percent. Enterprise sales are also expected to drop, by 7.2 percent, according to Gartner. Those numbers align with the 10 percent PC sales decline Micron Technology has forecast. Continue reading Decline in Global PC Sales Expected to Impact Chip Demand

As a result of the global shutdown, personal and business Internet usage is way up. SimilarWeb reported that users spent an additional 5 billion hours of screen time in March — a 13 percent leap over February — on the 100 most popular sites, including Facebook and Google. Likewise, Amazon, Netflix and YouTube are thriving. That’s led to a surge in demand for chipsets. Micron Technology chief executive Sanjay Mehrotra said his company is shifting production of its chips away from smartphones and towards data-center products. Continue reading Chip Sales Surge as Screen Time Increases During Pandemic

Although the White House has banned U.S. companies from selling technology to Huawei Technologies, some chipmakers, including Intel and Micron, are doing so by labeling goods produced overseas as not being “American-made.” The ban actually begins in mid-August, and U.S. suppliers, their attorneys and the Trump administration are mulling over if and how the ban impacts current sales. Meanwhile, FedEx has filed a lawsuit against the U.S., saying it cannot police the millions of packages it sends. Continue reading Firms Test Limits of Commerce Department Ban on Huawei