Semiconductor Summit Discusses Texas' Expanding Role in the Industry

Tribune News Service —  Chris Miller, a professor at Tufts University and author of the best-selling book “Chip War,” served as keynote speaker of the third annual Texas Semiconductor Summit on Wednesday at the College Station Hilton.

Miller shared the history of the microchip and the semiconductor as well as that of artificial intelligence while also explaining the role that Texas has played in that history.

“As many of you probably know, the first integrated circuit, the first chip was invented not too far down the road from where we’re sitting this morning. And like then, so much of the industry’s innovation is happening here in Texas as well,” Miller said. “The efforts that we’re seeing here in Texas are so important.”

The location of the summit, though changing hotel venues, was no surprise. The Bryan-College Station area and Texas A&M University are at the forefront of the burgeoning industry.

It marked the first summit under the direction of new Texas A&M Semiconductor Institute director Steve Putna and the first summit for Texas A&M Chancellor Glenn Hegar.

Hegar opened the summit by noting that Texas’ economy continued to grow and the importance of the semiconductor industry in the state.

“It’s amazing to me to know that your industry contributes $15 billion to this economy and 15 percent of the entire U.S. industry every single year,” Hegar said in his remarks. “We are very proud here at the Texas A&M University System with 12 universities, with almost 180,000 students and eight state agencies, that network is not just the power of this university, but all of that entire network and how we can leverage that, not just for your industry, for others here in the state of Texas. I want to say thank you for what you do to contribute to the economy here in the state of Texas, around the nation. Thank you for being in Aggieland.”

In his remarks, Hegar also noted that every day there are between 1,200-1,500 people who move to Texas, another sign of the strength of the state’s economy.

Visitors to the summit came from as far away as Idaho and Europe. The first day consensus was that Texas is in a strong position to be a leader in semiconductors and chip technology and that the future of the industry will be brighter with collaboration between industry members, the education system and the community.

The first panel discussion dealt with the economic future of the semiconductor industry. Among the panelists for that discussion was Salman Khan, the interim CEO of the Greater Brazos Partnership, and Terry Zrubek, deputy executive director of the Economic Development and Tourism Office.

The Greater Brazos Partnership is Brazos County’s economic partnership among the county, Bryan-College Station and Texas A&M. Khan, originally from Toronto, spoke of the draw of the region not just for him but for others as well.

“If you asked me three years ago where Bryan-College Station was, I wouldn’t know. And I think there’s a lot of people out there outside of Texas who don’t have an understanding of the capabilities that this particular community has,” Khan said. “This is the largest [university] campus in the United States — 80,000 students. And if you look at what they’re doing on RELLIS, it has everything to do with emerging tech and national security. There’s semiconductors. There’s SMRs, aerospace defense, all of the above. People want to work with this community. It was a no-brainer to kind of make the move about 2,000 kilometers south with two kids in the back.”

Zrubek spoke about the Legislature’s support for energy, noting that the state has given $10 billion for the Texas Energy Fund.

“It’s not something that we’re ignoring or turning our head to; we’re being proactive with it,” Zrubek said. “But it is, I don’t want to call it, in every weakness there’s an opportunity. And so we’ve seen the opportunity or the Legislature has seen the opportunity. And they put the money where their mouth is.”

The second panel of the day discussed how the state executes its semiconductor strategy. The panel was led by David Staack, A&M’s deputy vice chancellor for research, as well as David Daniel, Texas Semiconductor Innovation Consortium executive committee chair, Stephen Davis, director of Texas CHIPS Office, and Larry Smith, committee member on the Texas Semiconductor Innovation Consortium.

The consortium is an advisory committee to the governor and Legislature and is made up of representatives from 20 research universities in the state as well as business leaders.

“One of the key pieces of the [Texas CHIPS Act] legislation created the Texas Semiconductor Innovation Consortium. But this is a group of 20 public universities that meet regularly,” Daniel said. “One definition of success is that that group takes on a life of its own in a very positive way. Several comments were made earlier about the importance of partnerships. And this Texas CHIPS Act actually codifies the creation, at least, of the seed corn of the consortium.

“And so I think success means that group is active; it’s alive. People are coordinating, proposing ideas, developing partnerships that we did not have before. An important element of the consortium is the fund itself, the TSIF, Texas Semiconductor Innovation Fund, which had initially about $700 million and $250 million was added to that. So we’re up close to $1 billion. And that’s not counting the $600 or so million that was directed to Texas A&M and to the University of Texas at Austin.”

The third panel discussed how the Texas workforce is an important part of the growth of the semiconductor industry. The panelists shared the number of Texans who graduate each year with engineering degrees is nearly equal to the number of engineering jobs available but that the number of technicians each year is far below the number of technician jobs available.

The panel also suggested that it is important to get students interested in working on semiconductors at an early age.

© 2025 The Eagle (Bryan, Texas). Distributed by Tribune Content Agency LLC.