Crews at Intel’s site in New Albany, Ohio have installed the first major structural truss, the milestone that lets work move beyond the ground-level shell.
Naga Chandrasekaran, who runs Intel Foundry, called it a step toward expanded US leading-edge capacity. Compared with the promises made when the project was announced in 2022, it is a modest one.
Four years late and counting
Intel said in 2022 that the first Ohio fab would deliver chips in 2025. Completion is now expected in 2030, and a second fab on the same plot is slated for 2031. The site sits just northeast of Columbus.
The slip tracks a wider recalibration. Pat Gelsinger’s build-first strategy has given way to Lip-Bu Tan’s approach of waiting for customer orders before committing capital. Intel reached high-volume production on its 18A process in Arizona last year, and that is where its leading-edge output actually comes from today.
The customer question
A fab is a bet on future orders, and Ohio has no named foundry customer. In September, reports surfaced that SK hynix might lease space at the site to make memory chips. Neither company has confirmed anything.
For Intel, the truss is a useful photograph and a genuine construction step. Whether it becomes a working fab depends on whether outside companies show up to buy wafers, which is the question the whole foundry turnaround rests on.
