The company spent $3 billion to build the new "Fab 32" processor foundry in Chandler, Ariz., its first high-volume facility capable of creating chips based on 45 nm transistors.

Fab 32 is the company's sixth 300 mm wafer chip factory. Intel first produced 45 nm transistor-based processors, on a trial basis, in January at its Oregon development center called "D1D." Intel plans to open two more 45 nm, 300 mm wafer production plants next year, one in Israel and another in New Mexico.

The 45nm production uses breakthrough technology that involved coming up with a novel approach to reducing energy leakage in the microscopic transistors. The transistors use a Hafnium-based high-k material for the gate dielectric and metal materials for the gate, said Intel. The processors are about 20 percent faster and use about 30 percent less electricity than current chips based on 65nm transistors.

Intel says its 45 nm technology allows it to nearly double the number of transistors on the silicon, meaning more than 400 million transistors for dual-core processors and more than 800 million for quad-core units. In a statement announcing the new plant's opening, Intel noted 45 nm transistors are so small that more than 2 million can fit "on the period at the end of this sentence."