Austin, Texas
Samsung Austin Semiconductor, a subsidiary of South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co., has announced a $50-million capital investment at its Austin direct random access memory (DRAM) chipmaking plant. The upgrade will convert chip production from 0.17 microns to 0.146 microns, as well as producing double data rate (DDR) DRAM chips. The Austin plant, where 950 are employed, was built in 1996 at a cost of $1.3 billion. Since then, an additional $100-million in upgrades have been carried out. This year alone, Samsung will see capital expenditures in excess of $2-billion.