Spain plans to invest 11 billion euros to develop semiconductor industry
In his speech at the 2nd Economic Forum "Wake up, Spain!" on Monday (4 April 2022), Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez outlined that "semiconductors are an essential element of all technological sectors, and therefore in the face of digital transformation. of global geostrategic importance in the context of
Spain's 11 billion euros of public investment will be largely funded by the European Union's coronavirus recovery fund, which aims to mitigate the economic fallout of the Covid-19 crisis. The investment is in line with broader European efforts to support the semiconductor ecosystem.
On February 8, 2022, the European Commission published the European Chip Law to catch up with semiconductor production in other regions and increase resilience to supply chain disruptions. It will mobilize 43 billion euros of public and private funding for the semiconductor industry, with an ambition to double the EU's current share of global chip production to 20 percent by 2030.
Nadia Calviño, First Vice-President and Minister of Economy and Digital Transformation of the Spanish Government, expressed a positive attitude towards the EU's Chip Act.
"The experience of recent years has shown the need to reduce our strategic reliance on masks, vaccines or semiconductors," she commented in an official statement on La Moncloa's website. She said that the Spanish government has reached out to all companies in the sector and has made a major proposal for an innovative project at the European level "for companies to participate in the design and production of future European microchips".
The Spanish government, through the Plan de Recuperación, Transformación y Resiliencia (Recovery Transformation Plan), is really determined to contribute to the technological and industrial sovereignty of Europe for the development of the next generation of European microprocessors, but also for photonics, the Internet of Things or automotive components domain-specific applications.
