Softbank Group Corp has agreed to acquire semiconductor designer Ampere Computing LLC in a move that further broadens the Japanese investment firm’s push into artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure.
Softbank is buying Ampere in an all-cash transaction that values the Santa Clara, California-based firm at US$6.5 billion, according to a joint statement on Wednesday.
The deal for Ampere, whose early backers included Oracle Corp and private equity firm Carlyle Group Inc, adds to a wave of chip companies looking to capitalize on a spending boom in AI.
Photo: Kazuhiro Nogi, AFP
Oracle and Carlyle are selling their stakes in Ampere as part of the deal, which is expected to close in the second half of this year. Ampere will operate as a wholly owned subsidiary of Softbank, retaining both its name and Santa Clara headquarters.
Ampere, founded by former Intel Corp executive Renee James, makes processors for data center machinery including technology used by chip designer Arm Holdings PLC, which is majority-owned by Softbank.
“We are excited to join Softbank Group and partner with its portfolio of leading technology companies,” James, Ampere’s chief executive officer, said in the statement. “This is a fantastic outcome for our team, and we are excited to drive forward our AmpereOne road map for high-performance Arm processors and AI.”
In acquiring Ampere, Softbank is getting access to one of the few large design teams for the types of advanced chips used in data centers that isn’t already part of another company. It’s doing that as demand for those chips explodes amid runaway spending on AI infrastructure. Softbank also is looking for a way to increase its ability to capture some of that spending with advanced product offerings it doesn’t already have — even through Arm.
Arm is itself looking to move from being a provider of a layer of technology to a seller of more complete solutions that it can fetch a higher price. For Ampere, the migration to being part of a larger company will give it access to resources and possibly a larger set of customers that will make the economics of chip design work.
“The future of artificial super intelligence requires breakthrough computing power,” Softbank chairman and CEO Masayoshi Son said in the statement. “Ampere’s expertise in semiconductors and high-performance computing will help accelerate this vision, and deepens our commitment to AI innovation in the US.”
SEMICONDUCTOR SERVICES: A company executive said that Taiwanese firms must think about how to participate in global supply chains and lift their competitiveness Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said it expects to launch its first multifunctional service center in Pingtung County in the middle of 2027, in a bid to foster a resilient high-tech facility construction ecosystem. TSMC broached the idea of creating a center two or three years ago when it started building new manufacturing capacity in the US and Japan, the company said. The center, dubbed an “ecosystem park,” would assist local manufacturing facility construction partners to upgrade their capabilities and secure more deals from other global chipmakers such as Intel Corp, Micron Technology Inc and Infineon Technologies AG, TSMC said. It
EXPORT GROWTH: The AI boom has shortened chip cycles to just one year, putting pressure on chipmakers to accelerate development and expand packaging capacity Developing a localized supply chain for advanced packaging equipment is critical for keeping pace with customers’ increasingly shrinking time-to-market cycles for new artificial intelligence (AI) chips, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) said yesterday. Spurred on by the AI revolution, customers are accelerating product upgrades to nearly every year, compared with the two to three-year development cadence in the past, TSMC vice president of advanced packaging technology and service Jun He (何軍) said at a 3D IC Global Summit organized by SEMI in Taipei. These shortened cycles put heavy pressure on chipmakers, as the entire process — from chip design to mass
People walk past advertising for a Syensqo chip at the Semicon Taiwan exhibition in Taipei yesterday.
NO BREAKTHROUGH? More substantial ‘deliverables,’ such as tariff reductions, would likely be saved for a meeting between Trump and Xi later this year, a trade expert said China launched two probes targeting the US semiconductor sector on Saturday ahead of talks between the two nations in Spain this week on trade, national security and the ownership of social media platform TikTok. China’s Ministry of Commerce announced an anti-dumping investigation into certain analog integrated circuits (ICs) imported from the US. The investigation is to target some commodity interface ICs and gate driver ICs, which are commonly made by US companies such as Texas Instruments Inc and ON Semiconductor Corp. The ministry also announced an anti-discrimination probe into US measures against China’s chip sector. US measures such as export curbs and tariffs
RSS