Teltonika, a Lithuanian tech giant currently building a semiconductor plant in Vilnius, has ditched plans to extract pure silicon from quartz sand in Anykščiai, northern Lithuania, which has the largest deposits of the mineral in the Baltic states.
"The idea of purifying silicon from silica sand has been considered, but a feasibility study carried out by Teltonika's specialists has shown that it is not worthwhile to do so in Lithuania, especially due to the extremely high pollution levels caused by the currently prevailing production processes on the market," the company told LRT.lt.
Arvydas Paukštys, the founder of Teltonika, discussed possible plans for Anykščiai, northern Lithuania. At the time, he valued the potential project at around 460 million euros.
"Then we would have the whole chain of chip production from the sand to the final product [inside the country]," he told BNS.
Teltonika currently has factories in Vilnius and Molėtai and plans to invest 3.7 billion euros in its technology centre, High Tech Hill, in the Lithuanian capital over the next ten years. The facility is expected to include a semiconductor chip manufacturing complex.
Teltonika was founded in 1998 and has 2,600 employees and 30 offices worldwide.
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