Intel hasn't changed its mind about building plants in Ohio and Germany despite the downturn in the industry - but it may cut its project budget

This week the pages of the Intel corporate blog featured a post by Keyvan Esfarjani, executive vice president in charge of manufacturing operations for the corporation around the world.
He tried to reassure investors that deteriorating macroeconomic conditions would not force Intel to abandon its plans to build new facilities in the U.S.
and Europe, although he acknowledged that funding for these projects should be carried out in proportion to projected demand.Source image: IntelThe main idea of the message of the Intel representative was that the company should already prepare for the future growth in demand for semiconductor products.
It takes three to five years to build a plant and equip it with the necessary equipment, and the company simply cannot afford to ignore future market demands.
Intel's management shares the experts' optimism, predicting an average semiconductor market turnover growth rate of 5 percent a year by the end of the decade.
By the end of the forecast period, the market capacity should double to $1 trillion, so the company considers it necessary to invest in the construction of new enterprises, even now, when the current situation is not favorable to it.The second important idea, which broadcasts the executive vice president of Intel - the need for geographical diversification of chip production.
With 80% of capacity concentrated in one tiny region (meaning Taiwan), semiconductor manufacturing is very vulnerable, according to Intel.
Reportedly, this week the company acquired ownership of a piece of land in Magdeburg where a chip packaging and testing facility will be built, and eventually a second one will appear.
The company has also signed a contract with Bechtel, a construction contractor that will start building new Intel facilities in Ohio.
Here, the corporation expects to master mass production of chips using Intel 18A technology by 2025, with the U.S.
Defense Department mentioned among the first customers.
At the first stage, Intel expects to invest at least $20 billion at this site.
A management representative made it clear that the company will work closely with German and Ohio state authorities to determine when and how much funding is needed for the relevant projects.
Intel in this regard is going to be guided by the needs of the market and plan its major expenditures wisely.

In Europe, the prices of NVIDIA GeForce RTX 40-series graphics cards were much higher than in the U.S.- the cheapest one will cost €1099

NVIDIA before the announcement of graphics cards GeForce RTX 40-series reduced the recommended prices for previous generation graphics cards in Europe (for example, GeForce RTX 3090 became cheaper by €350).
At the same time the company significantly raised the price of graphics cards GeForce RTX 40-series compared to its predecessors, and in Europe, the price increase was much more significant than in the U.S.
Source image: NVIDIA The recommended prices in the U.S.
for GeForce RTX 4090, RTX 4080 16GB and RTX 4080 12GB models are $1,599, $1,199 and $899 (excluding VAT).
By comparison, at the launch of sales the GeForce RTX 3080 10GB video card in the U.S.
was priced at $699.
It turns out that the most affordable version of the GeForce RTX 4080 is $200 more expensive than its predecessor.
In turn, the GeForce RTX 4080 16GB in the U.S.
was $400 more expensive than the GeForce RTX 3080 12GB.
And the flagship GeForce RTX 4090 is valued at $ 100 more expensive than the GeForce RTX 3090, but at the same time for $ 400 cheaper than the GeForce RTX 3090 Ti.The situation with the recommended prices in Europe is much worse.
For example, in Germany the most affordable videocard of a new generation - GeForce RTX 4080 12GB - is evaluated by NVIDIA at 1099 euros (which is about the same as $1090)! In turn, GeForce RTX 4080 16GB and GeForce RTX 4090 got recommended prices of 1469 and 1949 euros respectively.Of course, German prices include VAT, which is 19%.
However, in the past, European prices were not that much different from American prices.
For example, the already mentioned GeForce RTX 3080 10GB got a recommended price tag of 719 euros in Germany.
GeForce RTX 3080 Ti was sold in the U.S.
and Germany for the same price of 1199, the only difference is that in the U.S.
it was dollars, and in Germany - the euro.But now the difference has become huge - the European were more than 20% higher than the American.
And this applies not only to Germany, but to all of Europe.
For example in Poland the cheapest video card of new generation is valued at 5,299 zlotys or 1,117 euros according to the current exchange rate.