A new step towards Catalonia having a chip development and prototyping center. The Catalan government has awarded the contract for drafting the basic engineering project for the construction of Innofab, a project resulting from collaboration between the Spanish and Catalan governments, to the IDP group, part of Bureau Veritas, for €2.6 million. The proposal, which must be submitted in April 2026, will be the starting point for developing the detailed engineering design and the subsequent construction project, which is expected to be awarded in the summer of 2026. Innofab will be Catalonia's leading chip center and will be located in the Parc de l'Alba, in close collaboration with the synchrotron, in the municipality of Cerdanyola del Vallès. It will represent an investment of €400 million, part of which will be financed with resources from the Next Generation EU funds. It falls within the framework of the PERTE (strategic project) for the chip and the European Chips Act. These are two European initiatives that seek to strengthen European technological autonomy, one of Brussels' priorities.

No sooner said than done. The US government has agreed to buy a 10% stake in Intel. This initiative, a level not seen in the private sector since the 2008 crisis, will inject $8.9 billion (around €7.6 billion) into the chip giant, as part of Donald Trump's strategy to boost the US semiconductor industry.

Catalan companies have secured €27.65 million of the €53.2 million in funding from the PERTE Xip call for proposals, which finances semiconductor projects, according to calculations made by ACCIÓ, the competitiveness agency of the Department of Business and Employment. This represents 52% of the subsidies allocated by the Ministry of Industry and Tourism for the microelectronics industry in Spain.

In May 2022, Seoul announced the most significant industrial investment in Catalonia in the last twenty years: a battery component factory in Mont-roig del Camp. With €600 million and 500 direct jobs, the Korean company ILJIN (now LOTTE) intended to establish its first plant in Europe.

The temporary layoff plan (ERTE) that Seat will implement as of September 27 due to the lack of semiconductors will affect a minimum of 482 workers and a maximum of 1,276 daily, depending on the supply of these materials. These are the numbers that have been agreed by the management and the unions in the negotiation of the ERTE, the second at the car manufacturer to address the lack of microchips. It will last, in principle, until June 30, 2022, as reported by Seat sources.