|
Trade Wars
Intel To Invest $5.7 Billion In Ireland Chip Production
Intel on Monday said it will invest 5 billion euros, or roughly $5.7 billion, expanding production of its advanced data center and artificial intelligence chips in Leixlip, Ireland. The project, which began earlier this year, will scale capacity for Intel’s Xeon 6 processors and next-generation variants built on the Intel 3 node, according to a news release. The chipmaker also plans to advance research and development activities and create high-tech jobs through its investment. Intel said it will upgrade existing facilities and install new manufacturing equipment at the Leixlip campus, including an expanded automated track system to enhance production.
The company’s latest investment plans would further solidify Ireland as a leading semiconductor manufacturing hub for Europe. “This €5 billion investment represents a definitive commitment to maximize capacity at our Leixlip campus and increase what we can deliver to Intel Foundry customers,” Naga Chandrasekaran, executive vice president, chief technology and operations officer and general manager at Intel Foundry, said in a statement.
Read more at Manufacturing Dive
Airlines and Hyperscalers Clamor for Turbines. Only a Few Companies Make the Parts.
Airlines and the hyperscalers have one thing in common: They are desperate for turbines to power their jets and data centers. At the heart of this surging demand are a few companies that manufacture the highly specialized parts. Western production of these turbine blades and vanes is concentrated in four companies, according to a report from SemiAnalysis. They are publicly listed Howmet Aerospace, Berkshire Hathaway-owned Precision Castparts, private-equity-owned Consolidated Precision Products and DPC Holdings, the parent of U.K.-based Doncasters Group, which made its public-market debut in New York last month. Precision Castparts and Howmet have the biggest market shares.
Turbine blades and vanes are “among the most demanding components modern industry makes,” the SemiAnalysis report said. Each of the parts is created with a new wax mold that is made from scratch, according to Kristine Liwag, equity analyst at Morgan Stanley. Wait times for aircraft run 10 years or longer. Heavy-duty power turbines are facing backlogs of as long as eight years, according to BloombergNEF. Smaller, aeroderivative turbines that are adapted from jet-engine designs can take 15 to 36 months. The long backlogs are helping drive demand for these companies’ spare-parts business. Airlines are forced to fly older planes for longer and need to keep buying spares.
Read more at the WSJ
Rolls-Royce Expands U.S. Generator Assembly Capacity
Rolls-Royce has expanded its U.S. manufacturing footprint with the opening of a new $24 million logistics and assembly facility in Mankato that will more than double production capacity for backup power systems used in critical infrastructure. The 250,000-square-foot center was built adjacent to the company's existing mtu power generation manufacturing facility and is designed to support increased production of mtu Series 4000 generator sets assembled for customers throughout the Americas. The expansion adds logistics and assembly space to meet growing demand for backup power systems used in hospitals, airports, industrial facilities and data centers.
Approximately one third of the capacity is dedicated to production and assembly activities. The building includes climate-controlled logistics and assembly areas, interior loading and unloading facilities, and space for future expansion. The generator sets assembled in Mankato are powered by mtu Series 4000 engines manufactured at Rolls-Royce's facility in Aiken, S.C., where the company announced a $75 million expansion in 2025. Together, the two projects represent nearly $100 million in U.S. manufacturing investment aimed at increasing production of backup power systems.
Read more at Assembly Magazine
IBM Warns AI Boom Squeezing Software Budgets
IBM said it had "faltered" in keeping pace with a shift in corporate spending from software to data-center infrastructure and would take a big earnings hit in the second quarter, in the clearest sign yet of AI's growing toll on the sector. IBM's shares tanked 25% on Tuesday, putting the stock on track for an even steeper single-day decline than it suffered during the 1987 "Black Monday" crash. Other software stocks also fell.
The warning shows that businesses racing to secure access to supply-constrained servers, chips and networking gear are diverting spending away from other technologies, adding to concerns about a software industry already rocked by the rise of AI tools that can write computer code and automate tasks. IBM said the weakness was largely in its mainframe business, which sells high-powered computers and software that process millions of daily transactions for industries such as banking and airlines. It also noted that businesses were prioritizing cybersecurity spending given recent breakthroughs in AI hacking abilities.
Read more at Reuters
Volkswagen CEO Says 50,000 More Job Cuts May Be Needed To Close Competitive Gap
Volkswagen may need to cut about 50,000 more jobs to match the competitiveness of rivals, its CEO told staff in an internal memo, effectively confirming for the first time that the automaker is looking to reduce up to 100,000 positions. Oliver Blume is battling to streamline Europe's biggest carmaker, whose profits have slumped as it faces billions of euros in tariff costs, stiff competition in China and pressure on its German manufacturing network to become more efficient. After already agreeing 50,000 job cuts across the group, including its Porsche and Audi subsidiaries, the company must work on reducing costs further, having calculated a cost disadvantage versus comparable companies of 20%, Blume said in the memo.
The memo follows angry calls from workers for management to explain its restructuring plans, which Blume presented to the company's supervisory board on Thursday. Sources familiar with the matter said labour representatives on the committee blocked the proposals, which were said to include job cuts and the possible closure of four factories. "As of today, we still cannot confirm competitive use cases for the plants of Emden, Hanover, Zwickau and Neckarsulm in the 2030s," Blume said in the memo.
Read more at Reuters
Mars To Close Nature’s Bakery Plant, Lay Off 345 Workers
Mars is closing a Nature’s Bakery production facility in Hazelwood, Missouri, according to a WARN notice filed with the state. The move will lead to layoffs of 345 workers. The plant will continue operating through 2026, with a permanent closure planned for September 2027. Layoffs will be conducted in September of this year and in February 2027. Nature’s Bakery is transitioning manufacturing to other facilities, according to the WARN notice. The soft naked snack bar brand has other production sites in Salt Lake City and Carson City, Nevada. The company said impacted employees can seek other employment within Nature’s Bakery and Mars.
Nature’s Bakery makes whole wheat, oatmeal, fig and brownie bars that are plant-based and nut free. Mars bought the brand in 2020 shortly after it purchased fellow snack bar brand Kind. “As we continuously evaluate our manufacturing footprint and evolving business needs, we’ve carefully made the difficult decision to close our Hazelwood manufacturing facility in September 2027,” a Mars spokesperson said in a statement. “This decision in no way reflects the performance of the site or our dedicated Associates.”
Read more at Supply Chain Dive
BMW Supplier Schaeffler to Deploy Hundreds of Humanoid Robots
Schaeffler AG plans to use humanoid robots in its factories in Germany. The Tier One auto parts supplier will use machines made by Humanoid, a UK-based AI and robotics company. As part of a strategic partnership, the company will purchase actuators from Schaeffler. Schaeffler plans to begin deploying wheeled humanoids by the end of this year, and eventually expects to have more than 1,000 machines in use globally by 2032.
“By supporting the phased deployment of humanoid systems in real manufacturing environments and serving as a preferred supplier of actuators, we are contributing to the industrial scaling of this technology while further strengthening our role in future-oriented motion solutions,” Jochen Schroeder, Ph.D., chief operating officer of Schaeffler. Artem Sokolov, CEO of Humanoid added: “We have already seen strong results from our proof of concept together, and now we are taking the next step to staged deployment. Moving into real-world operations is where the true value of humanoid robots is proven.”
Read more at Assembly
Tesla Repurposes Auto Lines To Produce Humanoid Robots
The assembly line that built the world’s first truly modern electric car has been decommissioned after 14 years. Tesla started mass production of the Model S at the former General Motors and Toyota factory in Fremont, California, in 2012, with the Model X SUV joining the lineup in 2015. That chapter is now officially over, as the part of the factory that used to assemble the two flagship EVs has been stripped out to make room for humanoid robots. Tesla shared a short video showing the decommissioning process of the original Model S and Model X assembly line, saying that the whole process took just 46 days.
Production of the Model S and Model X ended earlier this year, with the final units rolling off the now-decommissioned assembly line in May. On the same floor that churned out hundreds of thousands of EVs, Tesla will install factory equipment that will assemble its Optimus humanoid robot. Elon Musk, the company’s CEO, said at the beginning of the year that the new robot plant will eventually churn out one million units every year, though a concrete timeline has not been established yet. Tesla has claimed that Optimus will be “the biggest product ever made.” The company has been running a pilot production line at its Fremont factory, and has ramped up hiring efforts this year.
Read more at Inside EVs
Meat Giant JBS Axes 2040 Net-Zero Goal, Citing ‘Immense’ Execution Challenges
JBS, the world’s largest beef and poultry producer, will no longer aim to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions across its supply chain and global operations by 2040. The meat giant announced the cut in its latest sustainability report released Wednesday. The company’s updated sustainability strategy also no longer includes reduction goals for scope 3 emissions, which include all the indirect GHG emissions produced in its supply chain.
Instead, JBS will now focus on cutting scope 1 and 2 or direct emissions, which account for barely 3% of the company’s overall carbon footprint. Scope 3 emissions are responsible for the bulk of its emissions: the company generated over 184 million metric tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in scope 3 emissions last year. Chief Sustainability Officer Jason Weller said “the further we got into execution, the clearer it became that a Net Zero goal spanning hundreds of thousands of independent agricultural producers across tens of millions of hectares in dozens of countries — each with different practices, different baselines, and no standardized measurement infrastructure — is an immense challenge. Delivering a system-wide ambition at that scale depends on data, producer adoption, technology, and measurement infrastructure that are still developing across global agriculture.”
Read more at Manufacturing Dive
|
