The Biden Administration tapped a North Carolina economist Tuesday to help manage the $52 billion rollout of the federal CHIPS Act.
Ronnie Chatterji of Durham was named the White House Coordinator for CHIPS Implementation at the National Economic Council. His role will involve working with other federal departments to ensure the effective distribution of funding from the CHIPS Act, which the federal government passed in August to bolster domestic chip manufacturing.
Since last year, Chatterji has been the Chief Economist for the U.S. Office of the Under Secretary for Economic Affairs. He previously worked as a senior economist in the Obama Administration and ran unsuccessfully for North Carolina State Treasurer in 2020, losing to incumbent Dale Folwell. He is currently on leave from a professor position at the Duke University Fuqua School of Business, according to a news release from the White House.
Chatterji will be part of the CHIPS for America leadership team, a newly-created group tasked with implementing the CHIPS Act.
“In his role at the White House, Ronnie will help coordinate a unified approach to our key implementation priorities while ensuring that we have guardrails and oversight in place to responsibly spend taxpayer dollars,” said Brian Deese, Director of the National Economic Council, in a press release Tuesday.
‘It’s not just jobs’
Earlier this month, Chatterji joined North Carolina leaders at the Executive Mansion in Raleigh as part of the announcement that Durham chip manufacturer Wolfspeed would be opening a massive new facility in Chatham County. Silicon chips are used in a wide range of everyday technologies, including phones, cars and medical devices. Many hope the CHIPS Act will ensure the United States is less reliant on foreign countries, particularly China, for semiconductors.
“It’s not just economic security,” Chatterji said of the CHIPS Act during his remarks Sept. 9. “It’s not just jobs. It’s also national security.”
Wolfspeed executives anticipate their company will receive federal funding.
“We would expect to get some support from the CHIPS Act,” said John Palmour, the company’s chief technology officer and cofounder, in a Sept. 8 interview with The News & Observer.
This story was produced with financial support from a coalition of partners led by Innovate Raleigh as part of an independent journalism fellowship program. The N&O maintains full editorial control of the work.
Enjoy Triangle tech news? Subscribe to the N&O’s Open Source weekly tech newsletter here.
Read the full article here