Oregon’s largest private employer is shaving more than 600 positions from its workforce.

On Thursday, global semiconductor firm Intel told state officials it was laying off another 669 workers from its facilities in Hillsboro and Aloha before the end of the year. The computer chip giant already cut around 2,500 positions over the summer, bringing recent cuts to the company’s workforce in Oregon to over 3,100 in 2025.

“As we announced earlier this year, we are taking steps to become a leaner, faster and more efficient company,” an Intel spokesperson said in an emailed statement. “These targeted actions, while difficult, are part of our efforts to strengthen our position for long-term success and support the future growth of our business.”

Intel is one of the world’s biggest semiconductor companies, focused on designing, developing and manufacturing computer chips essential to modern electronics. The chipmaker is headquartered in Santa Clara, California, but its campus in Hillsboro is considered the firm’s research and development hub.

At its peak, Intel employed around 23,000 workers in Oregon. However, after multiple rounds of layoffs over the last few years, that number sits closer to around 18,000.

In recent years, the company lost ground to other chipmakers that focused on developing semiconductors for artificial intelligence. In fiscal year 2024, the company reported a nearly $19 billion loss.

The challenges led to the abrupt retirement of CEO Pat Gelsinger in December 2024. A few months later, industry veteran Lip-Bu Tan took the helm. Since taking over, Tan has announced a series of cost-cutting efforts, foreshadowing the steep job cuts.

In August, the company agreed to let the U.S. government buy a nearly 10% nonvoting stake in the business in the form of $8.9 billion worth of common stock. Around $6 billion of that will be funded with previously awarded, but not yet paid, grants from the U.S. CHIPS and Science Act, according to the company.

Intel’s layoff announcement comes as Oregon’s unemployment rate has slowly ticked up to 5% in August, the last month data was made available. Manufacturing jobs in the state, which include the semiconductor industry, are down 4.5% from this time last year.

News Source : https://www.opb.org/article/2025/11/13/intel-will-cut-more-workforce-oregon-2025/