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Qualcomm Approached Intel About a Takeover in Recent Days (www.wsj.com)

submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

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First four paragraphs (cause paywall won't let most people see this).

Chip giant Qualcomm made a takeover approach to rival Intel in recent days, according to people familiar with the matter, in what would be one of the largest and most consequential deals in recent years.

A deal for Intel, which has a market value of roughly $90 billion, would come as the chip maker has been suffering through one of the most significant crises in its five-decade history.

A deal is far from certain, the people cautioned. Even if Intel is receptive, a deal of that size is all but certain to attract antitrust scrutiny, though it is also possible it could be seen as an opportunity to strengthen the U.S.’s competitive edge in chips. To get the deal done, Qualcomm could intend to sell assets or parts of Intel to other buyers.

Intel—once the world’s most valuable chip company—had seen its shares drop roughly 60% so far this year before The Wall Street Journal reported on the approach. As recently as 2020, the company had a market value above $290 billion. The stock closed up over 3% Friday after the Journal’s report.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 month ago

Sorry, there’s no way Qualcomm is buying Intel as is

At the end of its third quarter of its fiscal 2024, [...] Qualcomm had $7.8 billion in cash and [...] just over $23 billion in total assets. That means Qualcomm, [...] is almost certainly looking at a stock-for-stock transaction. As of writing, Qualcomm's market cap is $188 billion, just more than double that of Intel's at $93 billion.

In fact, Chipzilla may not be worth much to Qualcomm unless it can renegotiate the x86/x86-64 cross-licensing patent agreement between Intel and AMD, which dates back to 2009. That agreement is terminated if a change in control happens at either Intel or AMD.

While a number of the patents expired in 2021, it's our understanding that agreement is still in force and Qualcomm would be subject to change of control rules. In other words, Qualcomm wouldn't be able to produce Intel-designed x86-64 chips unless AMD gave the green light.