14 DAY TRIAL // Advanced Micro Devices' chairman and CEO Hector Ruiz plans a trip to Albany, New York in the next month, to discuss the details about another new chip plant. The announcement was made during an Albany-Colonie Regional Chamber of Commerce luncheon, by Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, who also claimed that Hector Ruiz is interested in visiting the Luther Forest Technology Campus in Malta.
"Hector called," Bruno said. World's number two x86 CPU manufacturer munches on the idea of building a $3.2 billion chip plant. The initiative was announced back in 2006, when the company considered Malta as a possible location for the new fab.
The final deadline for the company to commit to the project without forfeiting $1.2 billion in state incentives is July 2009. The official response from Advanced Micro Devices was that nothing has changed since the company announced that it would build the plant here. However, the business community is waiting for a sign to show them that AMD will build the chip plant on their territory.
According to Bruno, Ruiz will return the next month to have another round of talks. "Ruiz wants to come to Albany some time in the next month," said Joseph Bruno. Advanced Micro Devices spokesman Travis Bullard confirmed that Bruno and Ruiz met and talked about the fab, but he refused to disclose further details of the conversation. However, Bruno admitted: "He [Ruiz] wants to come up here and get together in Albany. He wants to visit Luther Forest."
This might not be the right time for AMD to build another fab, given its precarious financial situation at the moment. Yesterday, the company published a report containing its last quarter revenue.
The chip manufacturer registered a quarterly revenue of $1.770 billion, a net loss of $1.722 billion and an operating loss of $1.678 billion. Still, if the company decides to build the fab in Malta, that would translate into about 2,000 new jobs.