Intel became the next tech giant to join as the investor of Arm, SoftBank's chip supply chain, following the interest of Apple, NVIDIA, Samsung, and more.
Intel Backs Up SoftBank's Arm Ahead of Upcoming IPO
For months, Arm Holdings has been gathering clients, partners, and investors. Tom's Hardware reported that chip giant decided to make an investment in Arm due to its strategical importance on the Intel Foundry Services and Altera FPGA unit.
"The fact that our organization, the IFS organization, is embracing ARM at this level, investing in ARM, doing partnerships with ARM, should give you a signpost that we're absolutely serious about playing in this business because if you're not working with ARM, you can't be a foundries provider," senior VP and GM of Intel Foundry Services Stuart Pann explained.
Being an Arm investor will give Intel a better access to the company's future chip design IP. Moreover, Pann shared that Intel will be focusing on other low-power chipsets as a way to penetrate the this type of market.
SoftBank Preps for Arm's IPO
Softbank is reportedly planning to offer $95.5 million of shares at $47 to $51 each. The company already reached a $55 billion-valuation, Bloomberg reports.
Recently, Apple signed a new deal extending its licensing deal with Arm until 2040. With more opportunities coming through SoftBank, New Street Research's Pierre Ferragu estimates that Arm will be worth $82 billion over the next three years.
The Arm Holdings Plc is expected to turn public sometime next week.
