Biden-⁠Harris Administration Seeks Input on Strengthening Domestic Supply Chains for American-Made Semiconductors through Federal Procurement

By Livia Shmavonian, Made in America Director, and Christine Harada, Office of Federal Procurement Policy Senior Advisor

Two years ago, President Biden signed into law the CHIPS and Science Act which made historic investments in American semiconductor manufacturing to reestablish the United States’ leadership in semiconductor manufacturing, shore up global supply chains, and address national and economic security vulnerabilities. As part of President Biden’s and Vice President Harris’s plan to ensure a future Made in America, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is working to help the Federal Government – the world’s largest buyer – begin organizing its demand for American-made semiconductors so that agencies can limit over-reliance on foreign countries for critical components.

As part of these efforts, today, OMB is releasing a Request for Information (RFI) to gauge the best ways to incentivize government contractors, especially of commercial IT products and services, to scale up their use of domestically manufactured chips.  The RFI may inform follow-on actions in support of the government-wide effort to leverage our existing manufacturing capacity as well as domestically manufactured chips and components in the future.  America invented the semiconductor, and now we are on track toward revitalizing our domestic semiconductor manufacturing industry – helping ensure more chips are made in America by American workers.

Today’s announcement follows a series of actions the Administration has taken to enable an essential supply of semiconductors fabricated, assembled, tested and packaged domestically.  These actions include the Department of Commerce’s CHIPS Incentives Program, which is catalyzing hundreds of billions of dollars in semiconductor manufacturing projects by providing direct funding and loans; the Department of Commerce’s CHIPS R&D and the Department of Defense’s Microelectronics Commons programs, which are investing in earlier stage microelectronic projects and infrastructure to support America’s future technical and manufacturing leadership; the Tech Hubs program, which has invested directly in regions to transform into globally competitive innovation centers.

The RFI encompasses in its scope leading-edge, current-generation, and mature-node semiconductors, and builds on the Biden-Harris Administration’s work to support American manufacturing and increase domestic supply chain resilience through direct procurement.  This includes stronger domestic buying practices including improved transparency and outreach to reduce the need to purchase foreign-made goods, higher domestic content requirements to qualify for preferences under the Buy American Act, improved demand signals for critical items, and use of existing buying strategies, such as dual sourcing and industrial mobilization, that are designed to support essential capabilities for critical products.

Specifically, the Biden-Harris Administration seeks to understand how the Federal acquisition system can best leverage domestic sources for semiconductors to ensure a safe and secure supply chain for U.S. government procured commercial IT products and services.  Market segments of interest include: telecommunication infrastructure and services, cloud and data center infrastructure and services, ICT devices (e.g., mobile phones, laptops), and transportation and vehicles.