Texas Instruments' $40 billion semiconductor factory brings thousands of jobs to North Texas
After years in the making, Texas Instruments' semiconductor factory in Sherman has officially begun production.
The $40 billion factory will produce tens of millions of chips that are critical for vehicles, smartphones, data centers, and simply everyday electronics — an industry that was disrupted during the pandemic.
"It was astonishing how much the semiconductor industry impacts everything. Literally everything has some form of electronics or is touched by the electronics; and so that is almost a single point of failure in our global supply chain was, was the disruptions that we would see coming out of Taiwan, and areas because of the pandemic, and so that taught us a lot," said James Grimsley, the regional innovation officer of the Texoma Semiconductor Tech Hub.
The project received initial support from the Biden administration and a warm welcome from Gov. Greg Abbott.
"Semiconductors are essential to building the space in artificial intelligence infrastructure that will truly define our future… With help from TI, Texas will remain the home for cutting-edge semiconductor manufacturing and the home of more job opportunities than any other state," said Governor Abbott
The site will create 3,000 new jobs for Dallas-based TI, and support thousands of additional jobs.
"These don't all require college degrees. There are many of these jobs that you can maybe take a couple of vocational classes either in high school or immediately afterwards, and you can get a good-paying job with benefits, and you start to work towards a long-term career," said Grimsley.