Intel has chosen Barcelona to open a pioneering microchip design laboratory. The American group has reached an agreement with the Barcelona Supercomputing Center - National Supercomputing Center (BSC-CNS) to open the microprocessor center at its facilities.
The investment to start the project will be 400 million euros, disbursed annually for 10 years. “Each year, the laboratory will capture 40 million euros. Half will be contributed by Intel and the other half by the Government”, Mateo Valero, director of the BSC-CNS, assures this newspaper.
The Government's investment, which will reach 200 million euros, is part of the approval of the microelectronics Perte, approved yesterday with an allocation of 12,000 million euros from European recovery funds. The microchip laboratory is undoubtedly one of the star projects of this plan. President Pedro Sánchez acknowledged this yesterday in a tweet, meeting with senior Intel managers at the Davos forum: "Thank you Pat Gelsinger [Intel CEO] for choosing Spain for the pioneering RISC-V processor laboratory."
According to Valero, the laboratory will start up imminently with the initial hiring of 300 workers and the forecast to expand the team in the medium term.
The facilities will be located in the Nexus II building, within the Campus Nord of the Universitat Politènica de Catalunya, a space that has been unoccupied since last year the BSC-CNS moved to new facilities on the same campus of the Campus Nord of the UPC. "It would take many years to build a new building and the chip design needs are urgent, hence the choice of this site."
The opening of the microprocessor laboratory is considered a key investment for the future of the country's economy. Beyond generating technology and attracting highly qualified talent in Barcelona, the arrival of a center of this magnitude in Spain contributes to reducing foreign dependence on microchips, key technological elements for the future of the industry. “We have created a pioneering center in Europe. The microchips that we will design in Barcelona can be applied in all kinds of technology, from cars, computers, supercomputers, mobiles...”, assures the director.
The project to attract this laboratory had been under development by the center for months. Throughout this time, the initiative has also had the support of the Generalitat. Yesterday, sources from the Conselleria d'Empresa i Treball congratulated themselves on the investment. “The Generalitat has always shown the maximum predisposition to welcome any project that consolidates part of the value chain of the European chip in Catalonia, it is one of the five priority projects in attracting Next Generation European aid”, they indicated.
Intel's commitment also responds to a historical link with the BSC, a public consortium participated by the Ministry of Science and Innovation (60%), the Generalitat (30%) and the UPC (10%).
Since 2011, the American group has carried out tests at its Barcelona facilities with the aim of testing and scaling its technology in the world of supercomputing. Over the years, the multinational has been renewing agreements with the center, strengthening a relationship that has now borne fruit in a first-class chip design center.
