Intel’s Israeli subsidiary more than doubled its exports in 2012 to $4.6 billion and is now hoping to bring manufacturing of the company’s next generation of chips to Israel.

At an annual press conference on Sunday (February 17), Intel Israel’s top brass said that the Intel Corporation has invested $10.5 billion in Israel over the past decade.

Intel Israel president Mooly Eden said the company accounted for 20 percent of Israel’s high-tech exports last year and 10 percent of its industrial exports, excluding diamonds. Intel Israel was responsible for a third of Israel’s exports to China.

“Were it not for Intel’s improved performance last year, Israel’s high-tech exports would have fallen by 10 percent,” he told the press conference.

Intel Israel’s top dogs also spoke about the company’s future. The world’s No. 1 chipmaker is currently building chips with features measuring just 14-nanometer in Ireland and the US. But Intel Israel executives want to see 10-nm production in Israel in the coming years.

“The average life of a technology is two to six years so we need to be busy to get the next technology, 10 nanometer,” Maxine Fassberg, general manager of Intel Israel, told the press conference. “We need to get a decision far enough in advance to be able to upgrade the plant. So for 10 nanometer, decisions will need to be made this year.”

Fassberg said the company has received $1.3 billion in government grants in the past. To manufacture 10-nm, she said the Fab 28 plant in Kiryat Gat would need a several billion dollars upgrade.