GlobalFoundries inks domestic chipmaking deal with Cirrus Logic
(2025/08/20)
- Reference: 1755703393
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2025/08/20/globalfoundries_cirrus/
- Source link:
Texas fabless chip firm Cirrus Logic has announced a new partnership with GlobalFoundries on next-generation bipolar-CMOS-DMOS (BCD) and gallium nitride (GaN) parts.
It says this will be centered around GloFo's New York and Vermont facilities respectively, as the industry continues to work around an increasingly challenging regulatory environment for importing chips into the US.
Cirrus Logic president and chief exec John Forsyth positioned the deal as a move to "deepen our longstanding relationship" with [1]GlobalFoundries , AMD's spun-out manufacturing division, which would "help accelerate cutting-edge mixed-signal chip manufacturing" within the US.
[2]
This, in turn, "strengthens the US semiconductor supply chain," Forsyth added. Unmentioned but impossible to ignore is that it would also help the company stay on the good side of the Trump administration and its increasingly heavy-handed approach to regulating technology imports.
[3]
[4]
Cirrus Logic designs chips but doesn't make them. GlobalFoundries makes chips but, prior to [5]its acquisition of MIPS last month , doesn't typically design them. The partnership will see the two collaborating on the development and commercialization of a next-generation BCD technology. This was first developed by STMicroelectronics in 1985 and allows chips to drive discrete high-voltage components for applications in the automotive, audio, and industrial markets.
Key to the deal is the promise that these next-gen BCD parts will be "capable of being manufactured" at GlobalFoundries' facility in Malta, New York. This would allow customers to sidestep the Trump administration's increasing focus on foreign technology imports, which have seen threats of [6]100 percent tariffs and even a call for Intel boss Lip-Bu Tan to [7]step down from the company .
[8]GlobalFoundries commits $3B more to US fabs in Trump tariff flex
[9]Please sir, may we have some Moore? Doesn't look that way
[10]Brit Apple semi supplier IQE's CEO departs amid reshuffle
[11]Raspberry Pi AI Camera takes inferencing load off the CPU
Tim Breen, chief exec at GlobalFoundries, claimed the deal would help in "strengthening domestic manufacturing capabilities that are vital to national competitiveness and economic resilience," verbiage clearly aimed to appeal to any US government representatives that may be reading. "This collaboration underscores the importance of resilient, geographically diverse supply chains for our industry."
The new partnership also covers the further development of parts based on GaN technology, with the companies working together and "accelerating innovation" in a project focusing on GlobalFoundries' GaN-on-silicon platform. This, again, is set to take place in the US, at the company's facility in Essex Junction, Vermont.
[12]
Cirrus Logic was founded in Salt Lake City in 1981 as Patil Systems, changing its name and upping sticks to Silicon Valley in 1984 before moving to its current Texas home in 1998. While readers of a certain vintage will primarily associate the company with sound, graphics, and modem chips from the 1990s, the firm today focuses on sound and haptic chips for phones, cars, portables, and wearables. Over the years, it has sold off or closed down various divisions including its graphics card arm (1998), magnetic storage chips (2001), wireless networking (2003), video products (2005), and its hybrid product line (2012).
Neither company responded to questions as to when or whether any new chips would actually be produced within the US as part of the deal, nor what kind of price premium they would fetch over those produced in GlobalFoundries' international facilities. ®
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[1] https://www.theregister.com/2009/03/04/globalfoundries_launch/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/systems&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aKXxF9VLpITvPuNhV1DGSgAAAEM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
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[5] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/09/globalfoundries_acquires_mips/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/07/us_semiconductor_tariffs_100_percent/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/07/republican_senator_queries_intel_over/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/06/04/globalfoundries_us_manufacturing/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/07/opinion_column_moores_law/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/30/iqe_ceo_americo_lemos_departs/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/30/raspberry_pi_offloads_ai_inferencing/
[12] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/systems&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aKXxF9VLpITvPuNhV1DGSgAAAEM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[13] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
It says this will be centered around GloFo's New York and Vermont facilities respectively, as the industry continues to work around an increasingly challenging regulatory environment for importing chips into the US.
Cirrus Logic president and chief exec John Forsyth positioned the deal as a move to "deepen our longstanding relationship" with [1]GlobalFoundries , AMD's spun-out manufacturing division, which would "help accelerate cutting-edge mixed-signal chip manufacturing" within the US.
[2]
This, in turn, "strengthens the US semiconductor supply chain," Forsyth added. Unmentioned but impossible to ignore is that it would also help the company stay on the good side of the Trump administration and its increasingly heavy-handed approach to regulating technology imports.
[3]
[4]
Cirrus Logic designs chips but doesn't make them. GlobalFoundries makes chips but, prior to [5]its acquisition of MIPS last month , doesn't typically design them. The partnership will see the two collaborating on the development and commercialization of a next-generation BCD technology. This was first developed by STMicroelectronics in 1985 and allows chips to drive discrete high-voltage components for applications in the automotive, audio, and industrial markets.
Key to the deal is the promise that these next-gen BCD parts will be "capable of being manufactured" at GlobalFoundries' facility in Malta, New York. This would allow customers to sidestep the Trump administration's increasing focus on foreign technology imports, which have seen threats of [6]100 percent tariffs and even a call for Intel boss Lip-Bu Tan to [7]step down from the company .
[8]GlobalFoundries commits $3B more to US fabs in Trump tariff flex
[9]Please sir, may we have some Moore? Doesn't look that way
[10]Brit Apple semi supplier IQE's CEO departs amid reshuffle
[11]Raspberry Pi AI Camera takes inferencing load off the CPU
Tim Breen, chief exec at GlobalFoundries, claimed the deal would help in "strengthening domestic manufacturing capabilities that are vital to national competitiveness and economic resilience," verbiage clearly aimed to appeal to any US government representatives that may be reading. "This collaboration underscores the importance of resilient, geographically diverse supply chains for our industry."
The new partnership also covers the further development of parts based on GaN technology, with the companies working together and "accelerating innovation" in a project focusing on GlobalFoundries' GaN-on-silicon platform. This, again, is set to take place in the US, at the company's facility in Essex Junction, Vermont.
[12]
Cirrus Logic was founded in Salt Lake City in 1981 as Patil Systems, changing its name and upping sticks to Silicon Valley in 1984 before moving to its current Texas home in 1998. While readers of a certain vintage will primarily associate the company with sound, graphics, and modem chips from the 1990s, the firm today focuses on sound and haptic chips for phones, cars, portables, and wearables. Over the years, it has sold off or closed down various divisions including its graphics card arm (1998), magnetic storage chips (2001), wireless networking (2003), video products (2005), and its hybrid product line (2012).
Neither company responded to questions as to when or whether any new chips would actually be produced within the US as part of the deal, nor what kind of price premium they would fetch over those produced in GlobalFoundries' international facilities. ®
Get our [13]Tech Resources
[1] https://www.theregister.com/2009/03/04/globalfoundries_launch/
[2] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/systems&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2aKXxF9VLpITvPuNhV1DGSgAAAEM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
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[5] https://www.theregister.com/2025/07/09/globalfoundries_acquires_mips/
[6] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/07/us_semiconductor_tariffs_100_percent/
[7] https://www.theregister.com/2025/08/07/republican_senator_queries_intel_over/
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2025/06/04/globalfoundries_us_manufacturing/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2025/04/07/opinion_column_moores_law/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2024/10/30/iqe_ceo_americo_lemos_departs/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2024/09/30/raspberry_pi_offloads_ai_inferencing/
[12] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/systems&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44aKXxF9VLpITvPuNhV1DGSgAAAEM&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[13] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/