Turkey to build silicon-based chip factory near Istanbul

ANKARA - Anadolu Agency

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Turkey is planning to build a silicon-based chip factory in Gebze in northwestern Turkey, Science, Industry and Technology Minister Fikri Işık told Anadolu Agency on April 21.
     
“The factory will be built under the leadership of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TÜBITAK) in cooperation with the Undersecretariat for Defense Industries, as well as companies,” Işık said.

The new project will be the second in Turkey after ASELSAN, a state-owned corporation that produces defense electronic systems.

In December 2014, Bilkent University started building a factory to produce gallium nitrate-based chips, but the Gebze project will be the “first factory with large-scale production capacity of silicon-based chips,” Işık said.

Işık said the factory would be built in Gebze, a town in Kocaeli province near Istanbul. It will be near TÜBİTAK’s Gebze campus and the Technology Valley that Turkey aims to build.  
   
Turkey has been working in recent years to establish a Silicon Valley-inspired industrial region in Istanbul, Turkey’s most populous province and economic capital.

“Chips are being produced in TÜBİTAK’s laboratory at the moment, but we do not have the infrastructure needed to produce chips in series,” Işık said, adding that he hoped Turkey would have the necessary infrastructure in the near future.