A $1.7 billion semiconductor expansion that would bring roughly 445 high-wage R&D jobs to Washington County needs one more local approval: the Tualatin City Council is scheduled to vote at 7 p.m. Monday, Aug. 10, on Lam Research's Strategic Investment Program agreement.
The Washington County Board of Commissioners already approved the deal at a public hearing Aug. 4 at the county's Hillsboro headquarters. One vote remains. If Tualatin signs off, the agreement moves to the Oregon Business Development Commission for final state-level authorization, KOIN reported.
The deal matters beyond Tualatin's borders. Lam Research operates a sales office in Hillsboro and has been part of the Silicon Forest semiconductor ecosystem for more than two decades. If approved, it would be the seventh SIP agreement in Washington County, following Intel deals in 1994, 1999, 2005 and 2014, and a Genentech agreement in 2006, all based in Hillsboro.
What the expansion includes
Lam's "TuX project" would add approximately 210,000 square feet of office, laboratory and industrial space to its existing campus on Leveton Drive in Tualatin. The facility would house semiconductor equipment manufacturing and R&D operations.
An economic analysis by Optimal Solutions Group projects the expansion would support about 1,420 construction jobs, another 669 jobs during equipment installation and roughly 445 permanent R&D positions paying an average of approximately $173,000 a year. Once operational, the project is expected to generate about $51.5 million in annual economic output in Washington County.
Of the project's estimated $831.8 million in construction spending, about $332.7 million is expected to stay within Washington County, according to the Optimal Solutions report.
The tax deal
Under the SIP framework, Lam Research would pay an estimated $84 million in property taxes over the 15-year life of the agreement, plus approximately $27 million in other fees, totaling about $111 million in payments to local governments. Oregon's SIP, authorized in 1993, requires companies to pay full property taxes on the first $100 million invested in an urban area, with a community service fee capped at $3 million annually.
"For more than 20 years, Lam Research has partnered with Washington County to shape the semiconductor ecosystem in the Silicon Forest, create high-quality jobs, and invest in our communities," Sesha Varadarajan, Lam Research's executive vice president and chief operating officer, said in a July 31 news release reported by the Hillsboro News Times.
SIP for chips, not data centers
The Lam deal uses the same SIP tax-break framework that Hillsboro recently moved to restrict for data centers. The Hillsboro City Council passed a 120-day moratorium on new data center development July 27. Council President Rob Harris had earlier proposed a separate six-month moratorium on data center SIP agreements at the council's July 7 meeting, citing a loophole that let developers bypass the city's Enterprise Zone pause.
The Lam agreement covers semiconductor R&D and manufacturing, not data storage.
Monday's Tualatin vote is the last local hurdle. If approved, the Oregon Business Development Commission must still authorize the agreement before it takes effect. Lam Research unveiled a $65 million, 120,000-square-foot office building in Tualatin in November 2025, well before the SIP deal reached a vote.
