The European Chips Act, adopted in September 2023 after 18 months of negotiation, commits €43 billion in public and private investment to double Europe’s share of global semiconductor production from 9% to 20% by 2030. It is the EU’s most ambitious industrial policy legislation — a direct response to the CHIPS and Science Act in the United States (.7 billion) and Made in China 2025’s semiconductor ambitions.

France has positioned itself as the EU Chips Act’s primary national beneficiary. With the STMicro-GlobalFoundries Crolles joint fab as the continent’s largest single semiconductor investment, Soitec’s SOI wafer dominance, and CEA-Leti’s research leadership, France extracts more from the European Chips Act than any other single member state. The alignment between France 2030 and the EU Chips Act is not accidental — French negotiators shaped the regulation’s structure to maximize the match with existing French investments.

The EU Chips Act: Architecture and France’s Position

The EU Chips Act has three pillars:

Pillar I: Chips for Europe Initiative (€11 billion) Public funding for advanced semiconductor research, design, and pilot production infrastructure. France captures the largest single-country share through:

• CEA-Leti designation as a European semiconductor research center (€1.2 billion in EU co-funding for Nano 2030 program)
• MINATEC campus as a designated European Chips Infrastructure Consortium (ECIC) node
• STMicro’s Crolles facility as a pilot line for advanced process development

Pillar II: Chips Production (State Aid Relaxation) The most commercially consequential element: allows EU member states to provide state aid above normal limits to semiconductor manufacturing facilities designated as first-of-a-kind in Europe or producing technologies critical to European supply chain security. This pillar is why France could provide €2.9 billion in grants to STMicro-GlobalFoundries.

France’s Chips Act notifications to the European Commission under Pillar II:

• STMicro-GlobalFoundries Crolles: €2.9 billion French state aid — approved (December 2023)
• Soitec Bernin expansion: €175 million French state aid — approved (March 2024)
• CEA-Leti Nano 2030 research expansion: €320 million — classified as R&D aid (approved 2022)
• X-FAB Corbeil-Essonnes modernization: €45 million — approved (2023)

Pillar III: Monitoring and Supply Chain Crisis Response Creates a European Semiconductor Board to monitor supply chains and coordinate crisis responses. France’s SGPI (Secrétariat Général pour l’Investissement) holds a permanent seat on the board, alongside Germany’s BMWK and the Netherlands’ Ministry of Economic Affairs.

IPCEI Microelectronics: The Pre-Chips Act Foundation

The European Chips Act builds on earlier IPCEI Microelectronics projects that pre-dated its passage. France was a lead participant in both:

IPCEI ME1 (approved 2018): 29 participants across 7 member states. French participants included STMicro (FD-SOI advancement), Soitec (SmartCut process development), and Thales (GaN power semiconductors for defense). France’s share: approximately €900 million in state-aid-exempt funding.

IPCEI ME2 (approved 2023): 68 participants across 14 member states. Expanded to include compound semiconductors (GaN, SiC), quantum computing chips, and advanced packaging. French participants:

• STMicro (GaN-on-SOI for 5G power amplifiers, €280M French state aid component)
• Soitec (engineered substrates for SiC and GaN, €120M)
• CEA-Leti (pilot line for advanced nodes, €200M)
• Thales (GaN-on-Si for phased array radar, €85M)
• Fraunhofer France / Yole Group research partnerships

Germany, Netherlands, and the Politics of EU Chips Allocation

Understanding France’s EU Chips Act position requires understanding the political dynamic with Germany and the Netherlands.

Germany’s position: Germany secured TSMC’s first European fab (Dresden) and Intel’s Magdeburg facility — representing the two largest single EU Chips Act investments, totaling approximately €15 billion combined public support. Germany’s approach prioritizes scale (advanced logic leadership) over France’s specialty-first strategy.

The tension: Germany’s aggressive subsidy offers drew criticism from France and other member states, who argued Germany was using fiscal capacity unavailable to smaller EU economies to attract investments that could have been located elsewhere. The European Commission’s Chips Act design addressed this by requiring cross-border first-of-a-kind criterion — facilities must offer capabilities not available elsewhere in Europe to qualify for unrestricted state aid.

The Netherlands’ leverage: ASML, the world’s monopoly supplier of extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines, is Dutch. Every advanced semiconductor fab in Europe — including Crolles — depends on ASML equipment. The Netherlands uses this leverage to ensure its national interests are protected in EU Chips Act governance despite not hosting major semiconductor manufacturing.

France’s strategic advantage: STMicro’s Crolles facility is the only advanced FD-SOI manufacturing site in Europe, qualifying unambiguously as first-of-a-kind and legitimizing the €2.9 billion state aid under Chips Act Pillar II. France did not need to compete with Germany for TSMC or Intel because France’s existing assets anchor a differentiated niche.

Soitec: The SOI Wafer Bottleneck

Soitec’s centrality to the EU Chips Act is underappreciated outside of the semiconductor industry. SOI wafers — Soitec’s core product — are required by every FD-SOI chip in the world. Soitec supplies STMicro in Crolles, GlobalFoundries in Malta (New York), and Samsung for SmartCut technology licensing.

The EU Chips Act recognized SOI wafer supply as a strategic European vulnerability: if Soitec had a production disruption, all European FD-SOI manufacturing would halt within weeks. The Chips Act’s Pillar II approval for Soitec’s Bernin expansion (€175 million French state aid) reflects this strategic logic rather than a pure commercial calculation.

Soitec’s Bernin expansion adds capacity for approximately 1 million additional 300mm SOI wafers per year — a 50% increase in output — specifically to support the Crolles joint fab’s expanded production requirements. Without the Soitec expansion, the STMicro-GlobalFoundries facility could not run at full capacity.

Key Performance Metrics: France vs. EU Chips Act Targets

EU Chips Act 2030 target: 20% global semiconductor market share (up from 9% in 2022).

France-specific targets and progress:

• Crolles 300mm capacity: 620,000 additional wafer starts per year (on track for 2026-2027)
• Soitec SOI wafer output: +1 million wafers/year (on track for 2025-2026)
• CEA-Leti research partnerships: 50 industrial partners on advanced node research (current: 42)
• Semiconductor workforce: +4,800 direct jobs in France (current: ~2,200 in progress)
• EU Chips Act funding received by French entities: approximately €4.3 billion committed through 2025

The 20% European market share target is widely viewed as aspirational rather than achievable. Even accounting for all announced European semiconductor investments, most analysts project European share reaching 11-13% by 2030. France’s realistic contribution: maintaining its specialty semiconductor position and growing the Crolles cluster’s revenue from approximately €3 billion (2022) to €5 billion (2030).

Related: Crolles-Grenoble Cluster | Soitec Profile | Semiconductor Funding Tracker | France 2030 vs US CHIPS Act