What is Advanced Electronics?
Advanced Electronics touches our lives wherever there is a need to move information. From your smartphone, credit card, laptop, car, the internet, and social media to your healthcare, travel, and work, Advanced Electronics enables and empowers our lives to be more productive, entertaining, and enriching. As our culture strives for efficiencies and enhanced user experiences, the demand for advanced electronics continues to rise.
Advanced electronics embody semiconductors, solar cells, embedded sensors, and the supply chains that support them. It is the industry that powers the information age that we live in today.
What does that mean for the construction industry?
Construction on advanced electronics projects continues at a rapid pace. With these mega projects, the construction industry benefits from an increased desire to bring manufacturing back to the US and close the gap on some of the globalization we previously witnessed in the supply chain. The CHIPS and Science Act is one mechanism fueling the funding for these projects, as is private investment looking to diversify their supply chain. According to Construction Dive spending in the manufacturing sector has ballooned since the CHIPS Act was signed into law in August 2022.
What challenges do we see with these new opportunities?
As witnessed with the record attendance at SEMICON West 2023 – industry engagement is increasing. Major themes for SEMICON West included supply chain management, diversity and inclusion, workforce development, global trade tensions, ESG, and the march to $1 Trillion in industry value. SEMI Standards 50th Testimonial video shared at SEMICON West highlights what industry leaders see as the future of innovation for the industry.
The increase in interest and new domestic opportunities also comes with its challenges. As has been reported, some projects have already experienced costly delays, including those related to labor and material shortages. Executing the construction of these technically complex facilities requires strict environmental controls and a skilled workforce experienced in implementing this type of work.
Our industry is currently struggling with labor demands, and supply chain needs are facilitating creative scheduling solutions to keep projects on task. This combination requires Construction Management firms to increase their problem-solving skills and get more creative when developing preconstruction plans.
How can we as an industry help?
According to an outlook from Associated Builders and Contractors construction firms will need to attract an estimated 546,000 additional workers on top of the normal pace of hiring in 2023 to meet the demand for labor.
We aim to leverage Gilbane’s national profile and build a project portfolio to create robust participation by diverse-, small-, and locally-owned businesses and their tradespeople. Gilbane offers the benefit of global experience and depth of expertise; we bring the benefits of these experiences and adapt them to our local communities. With a strong local presence in locations that are seeing strong interest from the Semiconductor industry, including the West, Midwest, Northeast, and Southwest, we are looking at ways to benefit our clients and the construction industry.
Gilbane, in a joint venture with DPS, was recently awarded NY CREATES’ newest building, Nano Fab Reflection – Albany NanoTech Complex . The planned 50,000-SF cleanroom building will further advance the Complex’s state-of-the-art research and development, education, and technology commercialization capabilities.
As part of our outreach plan, we will look at ways to strategically package scopes of work to increase local, small, and minority participation and offer opportunities for on-the-job training to help ease some of the labor shortage challenges on future projects. Check out our project website and stay tuned for informational sessions on how to get involved.
