Manufacturing Trending Away from China

Electronic Design News (10/13, Spiegel) – The challenges of manufacturing in China and the still recovering global economy cause electronics supply chain jitters among OEMs and encourage second looks at the shift to outsource and the potential benefits of keeping manufacturing closer to home…A number of major manufacturers have rediscovered the United States as a perfectly good place to manufacture products. While high labor costs and federal taxation drive up costs, local incentives can woo OEMs. GlobalFoundaries, a Sunnyvale, Calif-based foundry spin-off of AMD, recently broke ground on a $4.2 billion chip plant in Malta, NY.  New York State anted upped $1.2 billion to land the plant. Dallas-based Texas Instruments Inc will soon open a new Richardson, Texas, chip plant with a $1 billion analog chip capacity, the first facility designed to use 12-inch wafers. Part of the enticement included $300 million funding to university entities to bolster engineering support.