Workforce Development for the Semiconductor Industry – A Perspective

Both for civilian and military applications, the facilitating technology is semiconductor based. The United States has lost its leadership role in semiconductor chip production over the past several decades, creating potential threats to economic competitiveness and national security. The CHIPS and Science Act aims to address these issues by boosting United States chip-manufacturing industry and regaining the global leadership in chip production. With significant investment in chip production through this bill, STEM workforce shortage will only become more pronounced, which is projected to reach 1.4 million jobs in 2030 including semiconductor-specialized jobs. This article dwells on the need for sustainable workforce pipeline development and briefly explores the steps required to overcome the challenges involved. It emphasizes coordinated efforts among government agencies, industry, and educational institutions and projects a significant role for Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs). Along with major research universities, the MSIs need to develop their manufacturing programs and build the necessary facilities to educate and train a diverse semiconductor workforce to strengthen the U.S. semiconductor industry’s prospects of succeeding in a fierce global competition.