Commerce Commits Up to $389m for Power Chips Behind Fusion

The US Department of Commerce has signed four Letters of Intent worth up to $389 million in federal R&D awards, aimed at power semiconductors for fusion energy, advanced computing and the materials that feed them. The money flows through the CHIPS Research and Development Office. In exchange, the Department takes a minority, non-controlling, non-voting equity stake in each recipient.

The largest award goes to Helion, the Microsoft-backed fusion developer, which stands to receive up to $175 million. Helion will use the funds to build domestic capability in high-voltage power semiconductors and advanced energy power modules built for high-peak-current pulsed-power applications in fusion generation. The company says these devices will power, control and harvest energy from the magnets driving its fusion generators.

The internal split of Helion's award is concrete. More than $100 million supports semiconductor and advanced packaging R&D in Everett, Washington. A further $80 million is earmarked for next-generation semiconductor tooling, design and process development.

"Building fusion power plants at scale requires us to accelerate the development of technologies like semiconductors that are critical to making fusion possible," said David Kirtley, CEO of Helion. He framed the award as leverage for private capital: combined with additional private investment totaling $225 million, it will let Helion develop and manufacture advanced semiconductors in the United States that meet the efficiency, reliability and performance demands of its systems. He called it "an important investment in both America's semiconductor manufacturing base and the future of commercial fusion."

The mechanism here matters. Fusion machines are, at bottom, pulsed-power systems: magnets charge and discharge enormous currents in short bursts, and the switches and modules that manage those bursts are semiconductors tuned for extremes. Conventional silicon devices do not serve that duty cycle well, so the fusion developers are pulling specialized chip and packaging work into the domestic supply chain. In plain words, the government is paying to grow a niche semiconductor segment before the power plants that need it exist at scale.

Who else received funding?

Commonwealth Fusion Systems (CFS), backed by Google, will receive $85 million. The company plans to develop semiconductor technologies for robotic maintenance systems that improve the performance of its proposed ARC plant, and to improve radio-frequency power generators that support commercial fusion.

"This award marks an important opportunity to drive development of semiconductors and power electronics unique to the fusion industry," said Bob Mumgaard, CEO and co-founder of CFS. "These innovations will be a vital part of our global effort to deploy commercial fusion."

CFS carries the clearest commercial deadline in the group. Its ARC commercial reactor is expected to deliver electricity to the grid in the early 2030s, with a planned capacity of 400MW. Google has signed a long-term power purchase agreement and committed last year to offtake 200MW from the plant once it is complete.

What do the smaller awards cover?

Vertical Semiconductor, co-founded in 2024 by Josh Perozek, Cynthia Liao and Tomas Palacios, will receive up to $73 million. The MIT spin-out builds on research from the university's Palacios Group, a gallium nitride research lab. Its R&D funds will advance GaN power semiconductors, which the company says will enable more efficient, compact power delivery for advanced computing. In plain words, this is the award aimed squarely at the data center power problem rather than fusion itself.

Sibelco, an industrial minerals and materials firm specializing in mining and processing silica, receives up to $56 million. The money will develop next-generation purification and finishing technologies for ultra-high-purity quartz, a material used in crystal growth crucibles, processing glassware and other hardware throughout the semiconductor value chain. Sibelco says the support will let it strengthen domestic semiconductor supply chains with new ultra-high-purity quartz materials.

Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick tied the awards to the administration's energy agenda. "The Trump Administration is accelerating American semiconductor innovation to enhance our domestic energy and power resources," he said. "These investments expand domestic research, secure critical supply chains, and create high-paying American jobs."

The structure of the deal — federal money in exchange for equity, however passive — signals a shift toward the government holding a direct financial stake in the companies it funds. With CFS's ARC targeting grid delivery in the early 2030s, the first real test of whether these power semiconductor bets pay off is roughly five years away.