Intel has reached a deal with South Korean company SK Hynix to sell its flash-memory business for about $9 billion in an all-cash deal. With this, the U.S.-based chipset maker has moved away from the memory business as the flash memory pricing is on the decline.
As per the deal, SK Hynix is planning to buy most of Intel’s memory business, which also includes memory manufacturing operations in Dalian, China. However, Intel will keep the Optane line of memory products, which is developed in partnership with Micron Technology.
The deal is pending government approval, and both the companies are expecting it to close by late next year. In a statement, Intel CEO Bob Swan said “For Intel, this transaction will allow us to further prioritize our investments in differentiated technology.”
With this acquisition, South Korea-based SK Hynix will become one of the largest NAND memory makers in the world. As per the report from TrendForce, SK Hynix and Intel had a combined market share of 20 percent in Q2 2020, behind Samsung which accounted for 30 percent of the market.
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Intel has said that the company plans to invest the deal’s proceeds in building its presence in fast-growing areas like artificial intelligence and 5G networking. Bob Swan said, “this transaction will allow us to further prioritize our investments in differentiated technology where we can play a bigger role in the success of our customers and deliver attractive returns to our stockholders.”
The semiconductor industry has been seeing major developments in terms of acquisitions as the companies are now aiming to dominate the market. Last year, Apple acquired Intel’s smartphone modem business. Last month, NVIDIA announced that it is acquiring ARM Holdings from SoftBank Group for $40 billion.
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