Trusted foundry & secure microelectronics: who is allowed to fabricate the chips

Who is permitted to make the silicon that goes into weapons, cryptographic roots-of-trust, and critical infrastructure - and how states force that capacity onshore or into "trusted" hands. This block exists partly to fix a graph gap: Trusted_Foundry was a near-isolated (degree-1) node despite being a major topic. It now wires into the semiconductor, defense-prime, CHIPS-Act, foundry (TSMC/Intel/GF/Samsung), PQC, and geopolitics threads.

The US DoD regime

• DMEA / TAPO. The Defense Microelectronics Activity's Trusted Access Program Office has run the Trusted Foundry Program since 2003; the mission moved from the NSA to DMEA in 2015 - the same NSA-to-defense-microelectronics lineage that recurs across the surveillance threads. DMEA accredits the whole chain: design, mask, foundry, packaging/assembly, test, broker. Its point is guaranteed, low-volume, trusted access for defense - both classified and unclassified.
• Accredited suppliers include GlobalFoundries (Malta NY / ex-IBM East Fishkill), Intel Foundry, IBM (Trusted Supplier accreditation; secured manufacturing flows + embedded security under Trusted Foundry Access II, 2022-23), SkyWater (US-owned, Minnesota; trailing-edge/specialty), and BAE Systems' Nashua NH rad-hard center.
• RAMP-C. Rapid Assured Microelectronics Prototypes - Commercial (launched Sep-2021, completed by Intel) built the IP/EDA ecosystem on Intel 18A (RibbonFET + PowerVia), taped out and tested defense prototypes, and onboarded DIB customers (Trusted Semiconductor Solutions, Reliable MicroSystems). Awarded via the S2MARTS Other Transaction Authority under OUSD R&E's Trusted & Assured Microelectronics office. It targets domestic leading-edge - directly answering the Taiwan dependency.
• Secure Enclave funds a dedicated walled leading-edge Intel capability for DoD; SHIP covers advanced 2.5D/3D packaging + chiplets (assurance is not just the fab). The Trusted Foundry Access III solicitation (DMEA, 2026, ~$576M ceiling) generalizes the "trusted enclave inside a commercial fab" model.
• DARPA feeds trust/assurance research (ERI; provenance) in; defense primes (Lockheed, RTX) are the demand side that justifies the whole regime.

The EU

• EU Chips Act + IPCEI ME/CT (EUR 21.8B; EUR 13.7B state aid) span the value chain; ~EUR 69B catalysed by Oct-2025. Chips Act 2.0 (adopted 3 Jun 2026) pivots to supply-chain resilience (a B2B semiconductor supply platform), and a third IPCEI is being designed.
• Europe's real leverage is equipment: ASML's EUV monopoly (Draghi urged a fast-track lithography IPCEI). ESMC Dresden (TSMC JV with Bosch/Infineon/NXP) onshores a leading foundry, mirroring US CHIPS.

The UK

• National Semiconductor Strategy (GBP 1B / 10yr, up to GBP 200M in 2023-25) is deliberately niche - design, compound semiconductors, R&D - not leading-edge fabrication. Small vs the US/EU.
• NSI Act 2021. The marquee intervention: the UK ordered divestment of 86% of Newport Wafer Fab (Nov-2022) - held by Nexperia (Dutch-incorporated, ultimately China-owned via Wingtech) after two prior clearances. Nexperia said it was "shocked" and disputed the national-security basis (both accounts noted). The fab was sold to US-based Vishay for ~$177M (Mar-2024). The pattern extends: the UK ordered a Chinese consortium to sell 80.2% of chipmaker FTDI by Feb-2027 (legal challenges failed).

Allied layer

• Rapidus (METI-backed, Hokkaido) targets 2nm using IBM technology - Japan's onshoring/allied leading-edge bet (yield/timeline unproven). The IBM microelectronics lineage (behind GF, DMEA trusted services, and now Rapidus) threads through the whole allied stack.
• Pax Silica - reports that the EU and member states are preparing to join a US-led initiative aligning AI-chip supply chains among trusted partners. Resilience via trusted partnership, not autarky.

Honest limits

"Trusted" is a supply-chain-integrity designation, not a claim that a fab is technically superior. Accreditation and onshoring reduce but do not eliminate risk: leading-edge remains concentrated at TSMC/Taiwan (the chokepoint the whole regime hedges), and most domestic trusted capacity is trailing-edge / low-volume. NSI-Act divestments are government actions whose stated basis is national security; companies dispute it - motive is read from what the orders say, not imputed.

Sources: DMEA.osd.mil (Trusted IC / TAPO; NSA->DMEA 2015); Intel + IBM newsrooms (RAMP-C completion, Intel 18A, Secure Enclave; DMEA Trusted Supplier 2022-23); Trusted Foundry Access III solicitation (DMEA 2026); EU Chips Act 2.0 (EUR-Lex 52026PC0504, 3-Jun-2026), IPCEI ME/CT, SEMI Europe, Draghi report; UK National Semiconductor Strategy (2023); UK NSI Act orders (Newport 2022; FTDI 2026, Caixin); Vishay / Nexperia releases; Rapidus / METI / IBM 2nm. Cross-refs: spec-globalfoundries, spec-semiconductor-logistics-standards, geopolitics-taiwan-silicon-shield, geopolitics-chip-chokepoint-war, spec-defense-primes-pqc, macro-pqc-chips, spec-defense-industrial-base.

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