Uncle Sam bets $500M that Alphabet spinoff's AI can dig up new semiconductor materials
AI drug discovery is so last year, even though it hasn't accomplished much yet
In order to move more semiconductor manufacturing onshore, the US needs to depend less on foreign-sourced materials. Now, the government is giving an Alphabet spinoff $500 million in CHIPS Act funds to find domestic minerals, molecules, and chemicals needed for this process.
SandboxAQ (that’s AI and Quantum, for those wondering), which spun off from Alphabet in 2022 under the chairmanship of former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, announced the award Wednesday. The company won’t be doing any manufacturing – this is just an R&D grant to turn the startup's AI simulation software toward discoveries necessary to build a domestic chip industry.
According to SandboxAQ, the $500 million awarded to it by the Department of Commerce will go toward developing “novel molecules and formulations for semiconductor manufacturing," including chip production materials that are free of PFAS ("forever chemicals"),...
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