How to help reverse the trend of a fading microchip industry here in the United States – that’s the issue the president of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute helped tackle with others from across the country.
The federal government’s $52 billion CHIPS and Science Act is working to rejuvenate a once-declining industry.
“I think what’s exciting is bringing all that activity back to the Unites States, not only the production, which the CHIPS Act is helping with but the excitement about researching the next generation of technology,” RPI President Martin Schmidt said.
To help leaders in Washington, D.C. navigate the evolving industry and to direct investment to the right areas, a CHIPS Industrial Advisory Committee was formed.
“What’s happened with the CHIPS Act money, much of it has gone into the Department of Commerce,” Schmidt said.
The RPI president joined experts from the field, federal laboratories and other academic leaders on the panel.
“When I left RPI in 1981 with my bachelor’s degree and went to MIT to begin my Ph.D. research, it was in semiconductors,” Schmidt explained.
He called it a challenging time with semiconductor manufacturing moving offshore.
According to the Semiconductor Industry Association, nearly 40% of the world’s semiconductor production in 1990 happened in the U.S. Today, it’s less than 15%.
“What also happened was a decline in interest in the semiconductor field for new students coming into graduate schools to do research,” Schmidt said.
Helping reverse that trend will be a priority for Schmidt as he and his fellow committee members form recommendations to be shared with U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo.
“The committee divides itself up into working groups with specific tasks,” Schmidt said. “Maybe that’s thinking about workforce development, maybe that’s thinking about what technologies should be invested in, maybe it’s thinking about what’s the research agenda.”
And since the Empire State is playing a critical role in the industry’s restart, with $7.5 billion benefiting GlobalFoundries in the Capital Region and Micron building a new $100 billion chip manufacturing campus outside of Syracuse, having a New York voice at the table will be invaluable.
“Knowing that when you get the commitment of the government to do something big like this, the ability to be involved with advising them to do the various details of what they’re pursing, to me is very exciting,” Schmidt said.
