“The announcement of the five billion investment for the construction of STMicroelectronics’ Silicon Carbide Campus in Catania sounds like music”. Saro Pappalardo, general secretary of Fismic Catania, Confsal, comments joyfully on the announcement by CEO Jean-Marc Chery of the financing for the STM Etna site, given during a meeting with the workers. Between now and 2026, it will enable large-volume production of 200 mm silicon carbide (SiC) for devices and power modules, as well as for testing and packaging activities and the production of substrates made from this material. “Two billion are financed by the Italian state through the EU Chips Act,” adds Pappalardo. “News that represents the culmination of the commitment and sacrifices of Etna workers. As well as the demonstration that the synergy between workers, unions and local management pays off.”
During the meeting, the Chery CEO also declared that 2025 will be the right year to restart, describing a strong and competitive Catania plant with the WSIC. “The Catania plant will therefore see the construction of two new plants that will produce cutting-edge wafers,” underlines Pappalardo, “used to produce high-performance electrical devices, with applications in electric vehicles, fast charging stations, renewable energy and other applications industrial. Furthermore, artificial intelligence will favor a great variety of products that STM will sell, and Catania will be a strategic and central industrial hub for the years to come”.
Very positive news for a union like Fismic, which over the years has always worked, with a view to local development, to encourage new investments and new employment. “We still have no communications regarding the impact in terms of employment growth”, specifies Pappalardo, “but taking into account that the ‘rump up’ phase is expected to be completed by 2032, we will have the opportunity to discuss it with the Company. Also because we will only achieve real growth if we all work together to keep the efficiency of the existing production departments high, implementing the best synergies to make the new production immediately competitive”.
Hence the need to relaunch trade union action, to adapt it to the new challenges that will see the Etna plant as protagonist in the coming months. “The time has come, also for the union, to have the ability to raise the level of discussion and present a common front”, underlines the general secretary of Fismic Catania, “to ensure that the choices that are being made can produce new lifeblood and riches for our territory. We need to be a glue between the workers, the Company and the local institutions”, concludes Pappalardo, “to guarantee better and safer services (starting with the necessary improvements in the industrial area) and to make it increasingly convenient to invest in Catania”.
