Malaga's IMEC nanoelectronics centre obtains building permit

Malaga city council awarded on Tuesday the contract for the construction of the IMEC nanoelectronics centre at TechPark for over 168 million euros. Alongside this significant milestone, it announced another equally crucial one: the granting of the building permit, which allows the winning consortium (Sando, OHLA and Itercon) to begin work whenever they wish.

The path to launching this unique microelectronics R&D centre in Spain is progressing with Swiss (or Belgian, in this case) precision. In January, the Spanish society for technological transformation (SETT) launched a tender for the contract to draft the execution project and carry out the construction work for the facilities.

As the licence states, the complex will be primarily dedicated to research and development in the manufacture of semiconductor wafers. It will occupy six plots on both sides of Calle Bill Gates at the PTA.

It essentially comprises several buildings, with three distinct zones: the main activity development area (buildings 'FAB', 'CUB' and auxiliary buildings) on the R&D plot, the R&D office area with visitor car park on plot PS-01 and the general employee car park with auxiliary services on the R&D/DP plots.

The companies will also build interior pedestrian walkway to connect the FAB and CUB buildings, an exterior pedestrian walkway to connect the FAB building with the R&D offices building over a public road (dead end road) and four underground facility passages, two of which under Calle Bill Gates and two under the dead end road.

The complex will also have numerous technical support facilities such as a warehouse, cisterns for fire suppression facilities, a gas park, a waste management area, an area for emergency power supply (generator sets) and the largest of all, its own high-voltage substation.

Following the awarding of the contract, the plan is for the actual construction phase to begin in December of this year or January 2027. This phase will last at least until September 2028, after which another equally complex phase will begin: the installation, commissioning and testing of all the necessary machinery, which will take approximately 15 months.

About a month ago, Malaga announced another step towards the realisation of the IMEC project, in this case of a bureaucratic nature: on 6 April, the official state gazette published the registration of the IMEC Spain foundation, which will channel the activity of the Belgian research institute in Spain.