Intel is investing US$40 million over the next two years to expand its development center in Bangalore, the company said Friday. Intel has invested a similar amount on the facility since January last year.
Intel Chief Executive Officer Craig Barrett wound up his two-day visit to India on Friday by laying the foundation stone for the second building at the 43-acre Intel campus in Bangalore. The new wing is scheduled to be in operation by August next year.
The new funding will be used to develop next-generation chipsets based on the Centrino mobile technology platform, as well as for development and validation of laptop motherboards and thermal design support. Intel also is investing in the design and development of Windows-based graphics drivers for the Intel Extreme Graphics and Intel Graphics Media Accelerator product families.
The center will also develop enterprise microprocessors, including all aspects of VLSI (very large scale integration) design and development.
Bangalore has become a key design location for Intel. The development center there is already working on a variety of designs, including a 32-bit microprocessor for the enterprise market. Intel is also evaluating India as a possible location for a chip manufacturing facility, Barrett said.