On the desert floor of the Phoenix Valley, Intel has poured more than $20 billion into a four-story manufacturing plant that is the centerpiece of the ailing chipmaker’s comeback bid.

Inside the building, known as Fab 52, the company is rolling out a new manufacturing process to make more powerful and efficient computer chips. The process uses the tools from ASML, the Dutch manufacturer of lithography machines, to make Intel ’s cutting-edge semiconductors in the United States for the first time in nearly a decade.

During a factory visit last month, two of those $250 million machines sat largely idle while ASML engineers in sterilized white bunny suits worked on one. Two trailer-size footprints for additional machines sat empty nearby, a nod to Intel’s hopes it can eventually expand.

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