By Jeanne Whalen, Washington Post
The White House and Commerce Department on Tuesday announced the team that will oversee the doling out of $52 billion in federal subsidies for the semiconductor industry, pledging strict oversight to “responsibly spend taxpayer dollars.”
Distributing the money provided in the Chips and Science Act will be one of the biggest industrial development programs the federal government has ever administered.
Michael Schmidt will lead the new Chips Program Office at Commerce, which is expected to vet industry applications for chip-factory construction. He previously managed implementation of the Child Tax Credit program at the Treasury Department.
A separate Chips Research and Development Office at Commerce that will vet applications for R & D funding will be overseen by Eric Lin. He has a doctorate in chemical engineering and was previously director of the Material Measurement Laboratory at the National Institute of Standards and Technology.
The leadership, which is still hiring additional staff, will be “essential to bolstering our supply chains, spurring historic investments in research, strengthening our national security, and creating good-paying jobs for the American people,” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said in a statement.