Arm’s new CEO says its upcoming IPO will be for a « classic Arm » – the company it was pre-SoftBank.
The intended merger of Nvidia and Arm has been set by controversy, and now the deal is dead in the water, the firm’s new CEO said Arm is « well-positioned to grow going forward. » Nvidia announced the acquisition of Arm from SoftBank in September 2020. The agreement would have required Nvidia to pay SoftBank $12 billion in cash and $21.5 billion in Nvidia stock, with a further $5 billion secured under an earn-out clause. At the time, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang called the merger « complementary, » adding that Arm would retain its branding, « open-licensing model, and customer neutrality. » However, the acquisition required regulatory approval from the US, EU, UK, and China to proceed – and has been fraught with problems ever since. Read on: Nvidia seeking a way to complete tricky Arm acquisition Nvidia has previously tried to soothe critics of the merger by pointing out its past history with competitors, including its collaborative work with Intel and AMD. However, this was not enough to salvage the deal. On February 8, Nvidia and SoftBank jointly announced the termination of the deal « because of significant regulatory challenges preventing the consummation of the transaction, despite good faith efforts by the parties. » The European Commission (EC) first raised concerns in October 2021 that the purchase could lead to eventual restrictions of Arm IP, causing ripple effects potentially including price rises and limiting competition.
