A little-known Chinese company that styles itself one of the world’s biggest smartphone manufacturers is to acquire Dutch chipmaker Nexperia for 25.2 billion yuan (US$3.63 billion), a megadeal that needs US approval at a time when US concerns about China’s rise run high.
Wingtech Technology Co (聞泰科技) would effectively acquire 75.86 percent of Nexperia, which NXP Semiconductors NV sold to a consortium of Chinese investors in 2016.
It is to consolidate control of the Dutch chipmaker under a company that assembles devices for smartphone brands from Huawei Technologies Co (華為) to Lenovo Group Ltd (聯想) and Xiaomi Corp (小米).
China has been trying to free itself from a reliance on foreign technology, investing billions of dollars in the semiconductors considered vital to national security.
However, the deal for Nexperia requires approval from the US Committee on Foreign Investment, an agency that has already torpedoed a number of high-profile deals over the past year.
Concerns about China’s acquisition of technology have grown since US President Donald Trump accused the world’s second-largest economy of unfairly getting its hands on valuable intellectual property.
BRANCHING OUT
Wingtech itself is not a name that travels beyond tech industry circles.
It was founded in 2006 by Zhang Xuezheng (張學政), a former engineer-turned-executive at ZTE Corp (中興) — the telecoms gear giant that incurred US ire this year for violating export sanctions.
Like iPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海機密), Wingtech makes devices on behalf of other brands, such as Xiaomi’s low-end Redmi.
However, it is now trying to build up its semiconductor capabilities, including in chip design, manufacturing and packaging, and has said that it would grow its research and development arms in Shenzhen, Xian and Shanghai.
Wingtech has not fully outlined how is to bankroll the acquisition of Nexperia, which supplies automotive and industrial clients with components from diodes to logic packages.
The Chinese company in a filing on Thursday said that it would raise 4.63 billion yuan by issuing up to 127.45 million shares — still a fraction of the intended outlay.
Its shares have been suspended from trade since April, when it disclosed an outline of the deal and its market value stood at 19.4 billion yuan. The company reported about 16.8 billion yuan in revenue last year.
TECH RACE: The Chinese firm showed off its new Mate XT hours after the latest iPhone launch, but its price tag and limited supply could be drawbacks China’s Huawei Technologies Co (華為) yesterday unveiled the world’s first tri-foldable phone, as it seeks to expand its lead in the world’s biggest smartphone market and steal the spotlight from Apple Inc hours after it debuted a new iPhone. The Chinese tech giant showed off its new Mate XT, which users can fold three ways like an accordion screen door, during a launch ceremony in Shenzhen. The Mate XT comes in red and black and has a 10.2-inch display screen. At 3.6mm thick, it is the world’s slimmest foldable smartphone, Huawei said. The company’s Web site showed that it has garnered more than
CROSS-STRAIT TENSIONS: The US company could switch orders from TSMC to alternative suppliers, but that would lower chip quality, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), whose products have become the hottest commodity in the technology world, on Wednesday said that the scramble for a limited amount of supply has frustrated some customers and raised tensions. “The demand on it is so great, and everyone wants to be first and everyone wants to be most,” he told the audience at a Goldman Sachs Group Inc technology conference in San Francisco. “We probably have more emotional customers today. Deservedly so. It’s tense. We’re trying to do the best we can.” Huang’s company is experiencing strong demand for its latest generation of chips, called
Vanguard International Semiconductor Corp (世界先進) and Episil Technologies Inc (漢磊) yesterday announced plans to jointly build an 8-inch fab to produce silicon carbide (SiC) chips through an equity acquisition deal. SiC chips offer higher efficiency and lower energy loss than pure silicon chips, and they are able to operate at higher temperatures. They have become crucial to the development of electric vehicles, artificial intelligence data centers, green energy storage and industrial devices. Vanguard, a contract chipmaker focused on making power management chips and driver ICs for displays, is to acquire a 13 percent stake in Episil for NT$2.48 billion (US$77.1 million).
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
RSS