GlobalFoundries is coming to town, and they have about 400 jobs to fill in their multibillion-dollar semiconductor factory in Malta, N.Y.

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Later in the month, the company announced it had hired three high-level IBM executives for Fab 8, as the Malta plant is known, and in early August, GlobalFoundries held a job fair at the Sheraton Burlington's Conference Center.

GlobalFoundries has been rumored to be taking over IBM's semiconductor business, including the plant in Essex Junction. Bloomberg News reported on July 25, citing "people familiar with the process," that IBM rejected as too low an offer from GlobalFoundries to buy IBM's chip business.

In addition to the semiconductor plant in Essex Junction, IBM has another more modern chip plant in East Fishkill, N.Y., and a semiconductor packaging facility in Bromont, Quebec.

Bloomberg reported on Aug. 4 that IBM had actually offered to pay GlobalFoundries $1 billion to take the semiconductor business off its hands, an offer GlobalFoundries rejected as too low. GlobalFoundries was said to have demanded at least $2 billion to take the business, in order to offset the division's losses.

The latest anonymously sourced report on Sept. 17, from tech blogger Daniel Nenni at SemiWiki.com, says IBM and GlobalFoundries have reached a deal that will be officially announced in early October. Nenni reported on "pretty good authority" that IBM will pay GlobalFoundries more than $2 billion to take over its semiconductor business.