Overview
- The Commerce Department signed seven letters of intent on Wednesday proposing $874 million in CHIPS and Science Act incentives with GlobalFoundries, Kepler, Multibeam, Extropic, Thintronics, OBSIDIA Semiconductors and Aeluma.
- The department plans to take a minority, non-controlling equity stake in each company as a condition of funding to boost potential returns for U.S. taxpayers.
- The announcement lists company-specific maximum allocations and technology goals, including up to $300 million for GlobalFoundries to accelerate co‑packaged optics and up to $245 million for Kepler to develop high‑performance AI memory.
- The letters are preliminary and require further departmental diligence and formal approval before any awards are finalized or funds are disbursed.
- The moves draw on the CHIPS Act’s goal to rebuild domestic compute and chip supply chains and could create high‑paying R&D jobs while raising legal and governance questions about government equity in private tech firms.