Arizona

Arizona is poised for further momentum after TSMC, Intel and other semiconductor victories

Published

2 years ago

May 6, 2024

Arizona is poised for further momentum after TSMC, Intel and other semiconductor victories

Arizona, over the past three years, has scored some huge victories in luring major semiconductor investments to the state, including a major Intel Corp. expansion in Chandler and the construction of three new factories in north Phoenix by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.

Could all this be the prelude to an even bigger second act?

“There is critical mass — that’s the opportunity we have now in Arizona,” said Brian Harrison, president of TSMC Arizona. “We have a great opportunity to do even more in the next 10 years.”

Harrison described how the company’s factories or fabs in Taiwan have become hubs around which chemical suppliers, tool-equipment makers and other businesses have clustered. His comments came during a “Silicon Desert” forum hosted by EMD Electronics, which supplies equipment and provides testing services to semiconductor customers in Arizona and elsewhere.

The demand for semiconductors remains on a growth track, fueled by consumer products such as cellphones and computers, automobiles, data centers, and pretty much every other modern electrical device or industry. Artificial intelligence has provided new impetus.

A rising percentage of chips now are manufactured abroad, mainly in Taiwan, and reversing that trend has been the thrust of the CHIPS & Science Act of 2022. Under that legislation, the U.S. Commerce Department so far this year has awarded up to $8.5 billion in grants to Intel and $6.5 billion to TSMC, along with $162 million to Chandler-based Microchip Technology and other recipients.

Semiconductor manufacturers are using that money, combined with pledges for billions of dollars more in low-rate federal loans, to leverage their own investments.

TSMC’s planned Arizona investments have risen to $65 billion, along with $20 billion in recent new commitments by Intel. Those have helped to boost total semiconductor investments in Arizona to more than $100 million over the past four years, said Sandra Watson, president and CEO of the Arizona Commerce Authority and another speaker at the forum hosted by EMD Electronics, a business of German science and technology giant Merck KGaA.

Planning began before passage of key federal legislation

Arizona has fared well lately in this regard partly because of advance planning, Watson said. In 2021, a year before the CHIPS Act was enacted, the Commerce Authority brought together more than 50 industry leaders from various states, along with educational institutions such as Arizona State University and others, to develop a strategy. “We were able to establish a very strong plan,” Watson said, with collaboration the key.

Harrison echoed that sentiment and noted that TSMC considered many other locations in various states for its factories or fabs. Many of these other places had “different factions with their own vague agendas,” he said, rather than a unified gameplan like Arizona. “Everyone has water and roads,” he quipped.

More Arizona-focused technology announcements will be forthcoming, said Watson and Sean Fogarty, vice president of international business development at the Greater Phoenix Economic Council.

“We have a healthy pipeline of prospects” that are considering expansion here, with foreign businesses representing about one-third of those companies, Fogarty said.

Arizona already features a deep supplier base, a pro-business environment, favorable tax policies and an expanding workforce, Fogarty said. All that complements an educational system that is ramping up to funnel workers into the industry, from engineers at Arizona State University and the University of Arizona to technicians receiving training through the Maricopa Community College system and other programs. In addition, Arizona continues to add population, with many of the newcomers in the prime 18-to-44 working-age group, Fogarty said.

The power to make chip-expansion happen

Another critical consideration is the electricity to power these new industrial complexes, as well as related industries such as data centers, of which metro Phoenix now has one of the highest concentrations in the Western Hemisphere.

The EMD Electronics conference included assurances from both of the major electric utilities operating around metro Phoenix that power will be available when expansions get up and running.

“We are aggressively (adding) new resources over the next five years,” said Karla Moran, manager of economic development at Salt River Project. That includes more solar generation, mobile-home-sized batteries to store power early in the morning for release later in the day, and additional hydro capacity.

Kelly Patton, economic development manager at Arizona Public Service, said much the same. “We have prepared for this growth,” she said.

Both utility executives made the case for continuing to keep natural gas-fired plants in the mix for a while longer, despite emissions that make them targets for criticism from environmental groups and others. “If a monsoon hits and the solar field goes down, we can ramp up that natural gas,” Patton said.

Actually, the availability of renewable energy is another factor that gives Arizona an edge, as some companies expanding here, including Apple with its new data center in Mesa, have asked for it, Watson said.

A key factor in the Phoenix area’s success in attracting semiconductor manufacturers and other industries, she added, was ongoing efforts to keep the major utilities in the loop.

Some 54 megaprojects are in the works now across all industries, Watson said, and the Commerce Authority shares that information with local utilities. “We map out what sites they are considering so that our utilities can plan,” she said. “So the utilities know, in the next five years, where they need to be.”

While water is another critical need for the semiconductor industry, conference participants didn’t assess it as a key obstacle for Arizona, especially as manufacturers, including Intel, are striving to improve their recycling efforts. SRP, which supplies about half of the Valley’s water needs, said its reservoirs by later this spring are expected to be near full capacity.

For Arizona’s semiconductor industry, many of the “i’s” still need to be dotted and the “t’s” crossed. The giant fabs and expansion projects still need to be built, equipped and staffed with trained workers, many of whom haven’t completed or even started their educations. Suppliers need to be ready and waiting, with fewer of the supply-chain disruptions that have plagued the industry in recent years. Labor relations need to be maintained if not improved. The power and water for these complexes need to keep flowing, and partnerships strengthened.

But the infrastructure and other foundations have been laid and Arizona is in a good position for expansion, said Cori Masters, a senior semiconductor research analyst based in the Valley for Gartner.

“Now’s the time for ramping,” she said.

Reach the writer at russ.wiles@arizonarepublic.com.

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Arizona

Freed sex offender allegedly poses as doctor, sexually assaults student at Arizona elementary school: police

Published

13 hours ago

November 22, 2025

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Freed sex offender allegedly poses as doctor, sexually assaults student at Arizona elementary school: police

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Friday – A convicted sex offender freed from prison two weeks ago allegedly posed as a doctor and sexually assaulted a student inside an Arizona elementary school, sparking outrage and calls for answers from parents, according to reports.

Abel Kai Gblah, 25, is accused of sexual assault and kidnapping after he accessed school grounds and posed as a doctor to lure a student into a classroom and assaulted her at Orangewood Elementary School on Nov. 19, according to the Phoenix Police Department (PPD).

PPD officials said in a statement to Fox News Digital that officers were called to the school after administrators reported that an incident had occurred on campus.

“When officers arrived, they learned an unauthorized man had made it onto school grounds and lured a grade-school-aged girl into a classroom where he sexually assaulted her,” police said. “At some point, the student was able to push the man away. He then ran from the scene before officers arrived.”

NEWLY RELEASED VIDEO SHOWS COPS CUFFING TEEN LINKED TO VIOLENT SEX ASSAULT SCANDAL THAT HAS FAMILIES FUMING

Abel Kai Gblah was accused of sexually assaulting and kidnapping a student at a Phoenix elementary school on Nov. 19. (National Sex Offender Registry)

FOX 10 Phoenix reported that court documents show Gblah allegedly drew the attention of a student by impersonating a doctor and expressing that he had to examine her.

After fleeing the school, police located Gblah, who was booked into jail on multiple charges.

Gblah was released from prison two weeks ago on similar charges, according to the outlet, and was also allegedly involved in human smuggling across the U.S. border.

According to FOX 10, a prosecutor at Gblah’s court appearance said he was convicted twice in 2021 for sexual conduct with a minor and a registered sex offender.

FURY ERUPTS AFTER ACCUSED TEEN SEX PREDATOR DODGES PRISON; FAMILIES SWARM COURTHOUSE DEMANDING JUDGE’S HEAD

Abel Kai Gblah was arrested this week after allegedly sexually assaulting a student at a Phoenix elementary school. (iStock)

The news station reported that the Washington Elementary School District said in a statement that school administration immediately called 911 and placed the school on lockdown for over an hour.

“He was on campus for approximately 10 minutes and during that time, he made inappropriate contact with a student,” the district wrote.

The district shared a separate statement with Fox News Digital that it released to parents on Friday, which revealed the results of its internal investigation, including that Gblah was a former student of the school who attended from 2012 to 2015.

Abel Kai Gblah allegedly assaulted a student at Orangewood Elementary School in Phoenix on Nov. 19. (Google Maps)

While initial reports indicated that the Gblah gained access to the campus behind a student who had buzzed in, further investigation revealed that he entered through an unlocked lobby door, and walked in with a tardy student, the district stated.

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Following the investigation, a staff member has been placed on administrative leave, the district added.

“We understand how alarming this situation has been and want you to know that we are reviewing every aspect of our safety procedures and communication to ensure that an event like this does not happen again, wrote Orangewood Elementary Principal Emily Paterson.

According to FOX 10, Gblah is being held on a cash-only bond of $500,000, with a preliminary hearing scheduled for Dec. 1.

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Arizona

Predicting the final score of Baylor vs. Arizona

Published

1 day ago

November 21, 2025

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Predicting the final score of Baylor vs. Arizona

Baylor RB Bryson Washington — Chris Jones-Imagn Images

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Arizona

Trump says message from Arizona senator, others ‘seditious behavior’ punishable by death

Published

2 days ago

November 20, 2025

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Trump says message from Arizona senator, others ‘seditious behavior’ punishable by death

PHOENIX (AP/AZFamily) ― President Donald Trump on Thursday accused several Democratic lawmakers, including an Arizona Senator, of sedition “punishable by DEATH” after the lawmakers called on U.S. military members to uphold the Constitution and defy “illegal orders.”

The 90-second video was first posted early Tuesday from Sen. Elissa Slotkin’s X account. In it, the six lawmakers — Slotkin, Arizona Sen. Mark Kelly, and Reps. Jason Crow, Chris Deluzio, Maggie Goodlander and Chrissy Houlahan — speak directly to U.S. service members, whom Slotkin acknowledges are “under enormous stress and pressure right now.”

“The American people need you to stand up for our laws and our Constitution,” Slotkin wrote in the X post.

All of the lawmakers in the video are veterans of the armed services and intelligence community. Sen. Kelly was a U.S. Navy captain.

We want to speak directly to members of the Military and the Intelligence Community.
The American people need you to stand up for our laws and our Constitution.
Don’t give up the ship. pic.twitter.com/N8lW0EpQ7r
— Sen. Elissa Slotkin (@SenatorSlotkin) November 18, 2025

Trump on Thursday reposted messages from others about the video, amplifying it with his own words. It marked another flashpoint in the political rhetoric that at times has been thematic in his administrations, as well as among some in his MAGA base. Some Democrats accused him of acting like a king and trying to distract from other news, including the soon-to-be-released files about disgraced financier and sexual abuser Jeffrey Epstein.

What Democrats said in the video

With pieces of dialogue spliced together from different members, the lawmakers introduce themselves and their background. They go on to say the Trump administration “is pitting our uniformed military against American citizens. They call for service members to “refuse illegal orders” and “stand up for our laws.”

The lawmakers conclude the video by encouraging service members, “Don’t give up the ship,” a War of 1812-era phrase attributed to a U.S. Navy captain’s dying command to his crew.

Although the lawmakers didn’t mention specific circumstances in the video, its release comes as the Trump administration continues attempts at deployment of National Guard troops into U.S. cities for various roles, although some have been pulled back, and others held up in court.

Are U.S. troops allowed to disobey orders?

Troops, especially uniformed commanders, have a specific obligation to reject an order that’s unlawful, if they make that determination.

However, while commanders have military lawyers on their staffs to consult with in helping make such a determination, rank-and-file troops who are tasked with carrying out those orders are rarely in a similar position.

Broad legal precedence holds that just following orders, colloquially known as the “Nuremberg defense” as it was used unsuccessfully by senior Nazi officials to justify their actions under Adolf Hitler, doesn’t absolve troops.

However, the U.S. military legal code, known as the Uniform Code of Military Justice or UCMJ, will punish troops for failing to follow an order should it turn out to be lawful. Troops can be criminally charged with Article 90 of the UCMJ, willfully disobeying a superior commissioned officer, and Article 92, failure to obey an order.

How Trump, others responded

On Thursday, Trump reposted to social media an article about the video, adding his own commentary that it was “really bad, and Dangerous to our Country.”

“SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR FROM TRAITORS!!!” Trump went on. “LOCK THEM UP???” He also called for the lawmakers’ arrest and trial, adding in a separate post that it was “SEDITIOUS BEHAVIOR, punishable by DEATH.”

The Steady State, which describes itself as “a network of 300+ national and homeland security experts standing for strong and principled policy, rule of law, and democracy,” wrote in a Substack post on Thursday that the lawmakers’ call was “only a restatement of what every officer and enlisted servicemember already knows: illegal orders can and should be refused. This is not a political opinion. It is doctrine.”

Pentagon spokesperson Sean Parnell challenged the theory that illegal orders were being issued.

“Our military follows orders, and our civilians give legal orders,” Parnell told The Associated Press on Thursday. “We love the Constitution. These politicians are out of their minds.”

Democrats fire back

The lawmakers involved in the video issued a joint statement on Thursday in response to the president’s comments.

The statement, in part, says the lawmakers will not be intimidated or threatened to deter them from their sworn oath to the U.S.

“What’s most telling is that the President considers it punishable by death for us to restate the law,” the joint statement read. “Our servicemembers should know that we have their backs as they fulfill their oath to the Constitution and obligation to follow only lawful orders. It is not only the right thing to do, but also our duty.

“But this isn’t about any one of us. This isn’t about politics. This is about who we are as Americans. Every American must unite and condemn the President’s calls for our murder and political violence. This is a time for moral clarity.

“In these moments, fear is contagious, but so is courage. We will continue to lead and will not be intimidated.”

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