ByYue Wang,
Senior Contributor.
SoftBank Group said it bought American semiconductor design company Ampere Computing Holdings for $6.5 billion, completing a deal the Japanese conglomerate first announced in March.
Santa Clara, California-based Ampere, which was founded in 2017 by former Intel veteran Renée J. James, has become a wholly owned subsidiary of the Japanese company, according to an announcement on Wednesday. Shares of SoftBank closed 5.1% higher, after rising as much as 8% during Tokyo trading hours. The company is still reviewing the transaction’s impact on its financial results.
The group’s founder Masayoshi Son , who is Japan’s richest person with a net worth of $51.8 billion, has viewed the Ampere deal as an integral part of his vision to drive innovation in AI and computing. Ampere is expected to have a “strategic alignment” with other SoftBank group companies and investees, according to the March announcement. Ampere uses technologies developed by Arm Holdings, a British semiconductor design firm majority owned by SoftBank. “Ampere’s expertise in developing and taping out ARM-based chips can be integrated, complementing design strengths of Arm Holdings,” SoftBank said in its March statement.
