The French government will provide up to €2.9bn of state support for an investment of €7.5bn made by STMicroelectronics and GlobalFoundries to build a semiconductor factory in Crolles, southeastern France.

The subsidy package, announced on June 5, is the largest given to a company in France since 2017. The support comes from a €5.5bn package set aside to help double the production of chips in France by 2028 and forms part of the semiconductor component of the France 2030 investment program. Approval of the state aid by the European Commission was given on April 28.

Production at the plant in Crolles began in June 2023, less than a year after the announcement of the investment in July 2022. The plant aims to produce 620,000 wafers per year by 2028. It follows several announcements in France alongside a national foreign direct investment (FDI) conference held in May 2023. This includes a €5.2bn investment by Taiwanese battery maker ProLogium to build a gigafactory in Dunkirk.

Mondi scraps Russian asset sale

British paper and packaging company Mondi Group has terminated a deal to sell its largest plant in Russia for Rbs95bn ($1.17bn) due to a “lack of progress” in gaining approvals from Russian authorities.

In a release on June 5, the London-listed multinational said it “remains committed to divest Syktyvkar”, a pulp and paper mill that produces 1.2 million tonnes of products per year. Mondi had originally announced on December 15 2022 that it would sell all of its three Russian packaging converting operations to Gotek Group.

In April 2023, Russia’s government took temporary control of the Russian assets belonging to energy companies including Finland’s Fortum and Germany’s Uniper.

Half of multinationals plan to cut office space in next three years

A survey of executives in charge of real estate at 350 multinationals found that half of them are planning to reduce their office space in the next three years as they adjust to post-pandemic remote working habits.

The survey by real estate services firm Knight Frank found that among the companies cutting their footprint, the largest number was aiming to reduce space by 10% to 20%, according to a Financial Times report.

Almost half of the companies surveyed are planning to change their headquarters over the next three years. This comes as global real estate professionals continue to wrangle with a downturn in commercial property markets due to higher inflation, rising interest rates and a change to working patterns.

And finally: Notwithstanding its electric vehicle (EV) push, General Motors is investing $1bn in US plants to expand production of internal combustion engine heavy-duty trucks at two sites in its home state of Michigan, the automaker said on June 5.