LEHI — Contractors are preparing the interior of the massive building. Employees are coming on board. Supplier and vendors are setting up shop nearby.
Things are falling into place for IM Flash Technologies to begin production of NAND flash memory chips — used in a variety of consumer electronics, removable storage and handheld communications devices — sometime during the first quarter.
One step is hiring employees, and a Jan. 13 "meet and interview" event is designed to help the company meet its needs for production operators. About 200 have been hired, but IM Flash needs about 300 more.
IM Flash has 1,181 employees — about 400 are engineers — and figures to have between 1,850 and 2,000 by March. Meanwhile, about 3,000 contractors are at the former Micron Technology Inc. building, prepping the insides to accommodate the production lines and prepare other infrastructure for the company, a joint venture of Micron and Intel.
"We are under the most aggressive ramp-up in the history of the semiconductor world," said spokeswoman Laurie Bott. "The site is being developed to compete on a global scale in nanotechnology, and it's just very, very exciting. When you walk through here, it's just a 'wow!' at what's being accomplished."
IM Flash is about halfway through a $2 billion investment over a two-year period to build-out and equip the site, and it expects salaries over the next decade to total about $1.1 billion.
About 60 percent of the former Micron facility will be used to support the chip fabrication operations. So far, about 6.75 million construction man-hours have been spent on IM Flash, and about 4.5 million more will take place. To provide a sense of how massive the project is, placed end-to-end, the fabrication project blueprints would be 26 miles long.
"We're on schedule and are looking forward to being operational," Bott said. "And we want the Utah community to know that we are offering not just a job, but we will train someone and offer them a career."
Entry-level production operators will receive training at either Boise or Manassas, Va.; will receive $11 per hour to start; and will be eligible for performance bonuses for team members plus benefits including a matching 401(k), medical, dental, vision, holiday pay, a time-off plan and night-shift differential. The company also offers development programs for employees to pursue careers in either technical development or production leadership.
"We are looking for candidates interested in joining our Lehi team of production operators," Shawn Siddoway, recruiting manager, said in a prepared statement. "These are trainable, entry-level positions offering excellent wages and an outstanding career in the high-tech world of semiconductor technology."
"We hire and promote from within," Bott said. "The next step would possibly be a technician operator. Most of our management started at this level."
Bott said the company faces a couple of issues as it ramps up hiring. One is that most people know the operations by the Micron name and may not be familiar with IM Flash Technologies. "There are a lot of individuals who don't know yet who we are or what we do," she said.
Another is the tight labor pool.
Job openings for production operators, technician operators, engineers, administration and other positions are posted at the company's Web site, www.imftech.com.
Micron and Intel announced the venture in November 2005. Boise-based Micron owns 51 percent of IM Flash. Intel, based in Santa Clara, Calif., owns 49 percent.
Micron representatives at that time said only that Lehi could see "hundreds of jobs" as the new company ramped up operations. In March 2006, the company pegged employment at the facility at 1,850 over 18 months. At that time, it received a state tax-rebate incentive equating to up to 30 percent of new incremental state revenue over a five-year period after the plant is operating, estimated to be about $15 million.
E-mail: bwallace@desnews.com