Commerce Dept. starts work on finalizing funding for Micron projects

CLAY — The U.S. Department of Commerce is working on a due-diligence process on Micron Technology’s (NASDAQ: MU) planned projects in both the town of Clay and in Idaho. Micron has reached a $6.1 billion preliminary memorandum of terms (PMT) funding agreement with the Commerce Department under the federal CHIPS & Science Law. The PMT outlines key terms for Micron’s CHIPS agreement. To finalize the federal CHIPS agreement, the Commerce Department will now begin a due-diligence process on the proposed project and other information contained in the application, the office of U.S. Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer (D–N.Y.) announced April 17. After satisfactory completion of the due-diligence phase, the Commerce Department will finalize the PMT. President Joseph Biden on April 25 visited the Milton J. Rubenstein Museum of Science & Technology in downtown Syracuse to formally announce and showcase the funding agreement. This federal funding is part of a planned public-private investment of more than $100 billion over the next two decades. It represents the largest private investment in New York’s history, Schumer’s office said. The money “was made possible thanks to Schumer’s push to bring Micron to Central New York,” his office noted. “To all those who have had their doubts, believe it, Micron is here, Micron is real. And now with billions in federal investment from my CHIPS & Science Law, we are taking the next steps to get shovels in the ground to transform the Syracuse region and all of Upstate into a global hub for the chips that will power America’s future,” Schumer said in an April 17 release. “From smartphones to AI to our nation’s most sensitive defense technologies, the memory chips Micron makes are in nearly every product of our modern economy, but as the pandemic showed when we don’t shore up our supply chains and make these chips in America it can skyrocket prices and threaten our national security. This investment will build a more secure economy for the entire country, with Micron in Central NY as its beating heart.” Micron announced its plans for a semiconductor-manufacturing campus at the White Pine Commerce Park in the town of Clay on Oct. 4, 2022. Gov. Kathy Hochul reacted to Schumer’s announcement in a statement on April 18. “The largest private investment in American history is on its way to Central New York. New federal funding from President Biden’s CHIPS and Science Act will help lock in 50,000 jobs, a $100 billion investment, and millions of dollars in community benefits, along with aid from the Green CHIPS Act we passed here in New York,” Hochul said. This is the second agreement for a New York company from the CHIPS-incentives program funded by Schumer’s CHIPS & Science Law. Earlier this year, Schumer announced that GlobalFoundries in Malta in Saratoga County had reached a $1.5 billion in-direct grant funding pact under the CHIPS & Science Law, with an additional $1.6 billion in loans available. The firm will use the combined $12.5 billion public-private investment over the next 10 plus years to expand and construct a second, new state-of-the-art computer chip factory in Malta, per Schumer’s office.