INTEL IS PLANNING to create its future-generation processing chips at its Irish facility in county Kildare.
CEO Paul Otellini indicated that Ireland would be one of three locations for the development of 14 nanometer (nm) chips while briefing investors at an annual meeting earlier this month. The news was first reported here by RTÉ this morning.
A slide presentation at that meeting in California revealed Intel’s roadmap for taking its production process down to 5nm in the next decade.
By next year, it is hoped that 14nm processors will be in development at plants in Oregon and Arizona in the US and Leixlip in Ireland. They will begin shipping them by 2014.
According to slides obtained by PC Magazine and TheJournal.ie, the company is already building sites for the 14nm production at the three locations.
Such an investment would secure employment for many of the 4,000 workers at the facility and possibly create new construction jobs. However, no specific details are available from the company about their future plans for Leixlip. RTÉ reports that Intel has warned that proposals are always subject to changes.
According to PC World, Otellini said the company hopes to close the gap between the technology used to make mobile chips and that used for PC processors given the current trend towards mobile computing.
Research for lithography, materials and interconnects for chips even smaller than 14nm is already under way:
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