The US government wants to further boost the country's chip industry with billions of dollars in subsidies.
President Joe Biden announced on Wednesday that his government intends to provide the US chip giant Intel with up to $8.5 billion in direct funding and $11 billion in loans for computer chip factories in four US states.
The financial injection is intended to help increase the US share of global production of state-of-the-art chips to 20% by the end of the decade.
Biden made his announcement during a visit to the Intel production facility in Chandler, Arizona. During the meeting with Intel chief executive Pat Gelsinger and other employees of the company, Biden told Gelsinger "Well, you're bringing the future back to America, man."
Currently, state-of-the-art chips for smartphones, for example, are mainly produced in Taiwan by the manufacturer TSMC. The major concern in the West is that political tensions with China could interrupt the supply of semiconductors - with devastating consequences for the economy.