The Scoop
Intel is looking for a partner to help it run its Ohio fab project, the massive chip-making operation for US memory production that has been mired in years-long delays and setbacks.
South Korean memory giant SK Hynix is among those being considered to work with Intel in Ohio, rather than buy the operation outright, according to people familiar with the matter.
SK Hynix on Tuesday denied a South Korean media report that it’s negotiating with Intel to acquire the Ohio semiconductor campus. Semafor has reported that SK Hynix doesn’t plan to buy the semiconductor campus. The two companies have not yet engaged in formal negotiations about an operating deal, one of the people said. Another person close to Intel described the interest as very early.
A spokesperson for Intel declined to comment on the potential tie-up. A spokesperson for SK Hynix didn’t immediately return a request for comment. An Intel spokesperson previously told Semafor that “Intel is committed to Ohio, and we continue with our investments to accelerate site readiness.”
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Intel has been striking deals with rivals and customers alike since the US government took a strategic stake in the company last year. As it works with the Trump administration to bring more chipmaking facilities to the US, shares in the company have increased by 161% in the last year.
But the Ohio facility is central to that endeavor. And Intel, which broke ground on the Ohio campus in 2022 and said it would invest $28 billion in the site, missed its 2025 target to open the site. After a slate of layoffs, it delayed the opening of the site — its first new chip-manufacturing plant in four decades — to 2030.
Rohan’s view
President Donald Trump’s championing of Intel has been both a blessing and a curse: It’s given the company the financial wherewithal to compete with bigger rivals like TSMC, and has pushed customers and competitors that may otherwise have written the company off to engage with the chipmaker.
But the US government’s involvement also means that when the president speaks, Intel has to listen. In June, Trump said Apple and Intel were in talks about a deal to manufacture some chips, an admission that Semafor reported took Intel executives by surprise. Apple CEO Tim Cook last month told The Wall Street Journal that supply constraints and price increases among suppliers like SK Hynix had “become unsustainable” for the iPhone maker.
It isn’t clear what decisions Intel has or will make around Apple. But the Trump administration is pushing the company to make more chips in the US. And if partnering with SK Hynix is the way to speed up production at its beleaguered chip plant while retaining possession of it, it may be one way to curry favor with Intel’s most important shareholder.