Calviño tenders only 1% of the largest share of European funds one year after announcing it
The Government shows enormous difficulties to execute its main plans with European funds, despite the long preparation time. On the one hand, the first vice president of the Government, Nadia Calviño, announced this Thursday that the Perte Chip -the crucial semiconductor- is finally starting one year after announcing it. But it does so with tenders that barely represent 1% of the expected amount.
This is the Strategic Project for the economic recovery and transformation Chip announced
Created by Calviño on May 24, 2022 with an endowment of 12,250 million. It is the largest of all those approved by the Council of Ministers.
However, the vice president assured in the
IV International Expansion Forum
that for the moment it will only issue a tender worth 80 million for “R&D missions” and another 60 million for “public-private collaboration chairs”.
Calviño did not specify when he will tender the remaining more than 12,000 million,
while multinationals in the sector are already choosing other European countries to set up factories.
“Soon we will launch the first calls for the Perte Chip, specifically the first two programs,” he said.. Regarding the first, he said that it is to promote research and development in microelectronics, and the second, chairs capable of
“attract cutting-edge talent in this sector”.
However, the great objective of the Perte, according to the statement made last year by the Council of Ministers, is to “strengthen the design and production capacities of the microelectronics and semiconductor industry in Spain from a comprehensive perspective and promote national strategic autonomy and of the EU in this sector.
The challenge is to attract factories of these essential products for daily life
, from mobile phones and cars to household appliances, but so far, not even the 12.25 billion bazooka has achieved enough applicants to already draw calls.
“We collaborate with Sánchez to attract semiconductor factories to Spain but it is complicated”,
told this newspaper last March
the president of Qualcomm,
Christian Amon
. The president of Intel, the American
Pat Gelsinger
Until now, it has not shown interest in setting up factories like in Germany or Italy beyond the collaboration of the Barcelona Supercomputing Center.
Calviño presented his announcement in any case as something positive and boasted that “Spain is at the head of the EU in execution” with
“400,000 company projects financed”
. “Where are they?” ironized the former president of the Government,
Jose Maria Aznar
, in a subsequent intervention in the same forum.
On the other hand, the Ministry of Industry announced this Thursday
in an official statement
that «the second call for the Perte VEC [the star of the Electric and Connected Vehicle] is scheduled to be announced in the month of June and
will be endowed with 1,475 million euros
». In other words, 700 million less than what would be necessary to cover what was left empty in the first call. This, despite the fact that the Ministry has relaxed requirements. According to Industry, the second phase “contains the extension of the aid thresholds introduced in the Category Exemption Regulation and the inclusion of flexibility for certain projects.”
Nevertheless,
Ministry sources indicate that the 1,475 million are not the final figure
, because an addendum is being negotiated with Brussels that can broadly complement the second call.
What is already certain, according to the Minister of Industry,
Hector Gomez
, is that Brussels has approved a line reserved for battery factories worth 837 million.