ollowing the recent acquisition of 195 acres of land from the City of McGregor, EFC Gases & Advanced Materials has unveiled plans for a cutting-edge manufacturing facility in Texas. Massachusetts-based EFC currently serves the semiconductor and aerospace industries with plants in Hatfield and Cherryville, Pennsylvania. This latest $210 million expansion in EFC’s domestic production capabilities will feature chemical synthesis operations for electronic gases and deposition precursors, specialty gas transfill facilities, a central laboratory, a logistics hub, and an administration building. Located within the McGregor Industrial Park, the new EFC facility is expected to create at least 120 jobs. “As an integral part of the semiconductor supply chain, we at EFC Gases & Advanced Materials are excited to collaborate with the City of McGregor and deeply value their support during the early stages of this project,” stated Pavel A. Perlov, President and CEO of EFC. “The new facility will play a crucial role in onshoring essential materials for semiconductor fabs, aligning seamlessly with Texas’ thriving semiconductor industry.” “The new facility will play a crucial role in onshoring essential materials for semiconductor fabs, aligning seamlessly with Texas’ thriving semiconductor industry.” — Pavel A. Perlov, President/CEO, EFC The City of McGregor will support the project with infrastructure improvements, including extending water and wastewater lines and assisting in the construction of an industrial rail spur to enhance operational efficiency. McLennan County is also providing financial support to facilitate the development. “The McLennan County Commissioners Court proudly welcomes EFC to McLennan County,” said Judge Scott Felton of McLennan County. “Our strategic location between Austin and Dallas-Fort Worth, along with access to a robust customer base, were pivotal factors in their decision to set up operations in McGregor. This achievement demonstrates McLennan County’s ability to support diverse industries through our commitment to attracting, training, and employing a highly skilled workforce.” Since the enactment of the CHIPS and Science Act in 2020, over 83 new U.S. semiconductor ecosystem projects valued at $447 billion have been announced, with more than $88 billion earmarked for Texas, according to the Semiconductor Industry Association (SIA). This growth underscores the critical demand for the high-quality materials and gases that EFC provides. “The collaborative efforts of the City of McGregor, McLennan County, the State of Texas, and various regional economic development organizations present exceptional partnership opportunities,” remarked Tommy Arndt, Executive VP of Operations at EFC. “The support from McGregor, McLennan County, and the State of Texas has been tremendous, and we look forward to further exploring these potential partnerships. Crusoe Plans 200 MW AI Data Center At Lancium Clean Campus Crusoe Energy Systems LLC will build a 200 MW data center at the Lancium Clean Campus outside Abilene, Texas. Crusoe will work with energy technology and infrastructure company Lancium to bring the AI data center online in the coming months. It is the first phase of Crusoe’s data center development, which will expand to enable AI workloads at scale across 1.2 GW of power capacity at the Lancium Clean Campus. Supported by a multibillion-dollar investment, the purpose-built data center will include high-density data halls specially designed to enable AI workloads including plans to draw on local renewable energy. The design will be optimized for direct-to-chip liquid cooling or rear-door heat exchangers and will be flexible enough to include air cooling. At completion, each data center building will be able to operate up to 100,000 GPUs on a single integrated network fabric, advancing the frontier of data center design and scale for AI training and inference workloads. “Data centers are rapidly evolving to support modern AI workloads, requiring new levels of high density rack space, direct-to-chip liquid cooling and unprecedented overall energy demands. We’ve designed this data center to enable the largest clusters of GPUs in the world to drive new breakthroughs in AI,” said Chase Lochmiller, Crusoe’s Co-Founder and CEO. “Given its leadership in renewable energy and plans for the site, working with Lancium in Abilene presents a unique opportunity to sustainably power the future of AI and we’re thrilled to have the support of the city in this ambitious endeavor.” “Given its leadership in renewable energy and plans for the site, working with Lancium in Abilene presents a unique opportunity to sustainably power the future of AI and we’re thrilled to have the support of the city in this ambitious endeavor.” — Chase Lochmiller, Co-Founder/CEO, Crusoe “Lancium’s mission to decarbonize compute for the most energy-intensive workloads and this scale and type of data center is game-changing,” said Michael McNamara, co-founder and chief executive officer of Lancium. “Our energy management expertise, the integration of incremental storage and solar generation resources behind-the-meter at the campus, and Crusoe’s design approach will combine to deliver the maximum amount of green energy at the lowest possible cost, while bringing significant benefits to the Abilene community.” The data center is expected to begin operating in 2025. (Photo: Greater San Marcos Partnership) Futronic Sets Sights On City Of Buda South Korea-based motor vehicle transmission and powertrain parts manufacturer Futronic USA Inc. is looking to the City of Buda for its first-ever U.S. location. The Tesla supplier’s total investment in the 66,250-square-foot facility is estimated at $28 million, which will include building improvements, fixtures and equipment. The company expects to create at least 200 jobs, with an average wage of $52,000.