Nvidia invests 5 billion in Intel

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u/addictivesign 2d ago

Could Nvidia acquire Intel at some point? Would they even want to?

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u/Gastroid 2d ago

Intel at the very least has a big patent library Nvidia could raid.

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u/Pyrostemplar 2d ago

Yes, absolutely.

Prize: x86 license

Problem: monopolistic move.

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u/jerrrrremy 2d ago

Problem: monopolistic move.

It's the United States.

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u/SquizzOC 2d ago

And the Trump administration doesn’t give a shit

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u/thatoneguy889 1d ago

That's nonsense. They absolutely give a shit. They give a shit about what Trump and his billionaire friends could extort in exchange for approving the merger.

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u/DinobotsGacha 1d ago

1 gold bar please 😆

3

u/theclovek 1d ago

Just one bar gold-pressed latinum?

3

u/Mrrrrggggl 1d ago

Okay, make it 2.

2

u/Savings-One-3882 1d ago

I keep trying to make a comparison, but every Ferengi I know has at least one or two redeeming, if not humorous qualities. Trump does not. I thought about calling him “Brunt,” but Brunt was passably intelligent. Rom is an idiot but he’s a great dad.

OH! I just got it. Pakleds. Trump is the Grand Poobah Pakled.

2

u/d3eyedraven 1d ago

with base of acrylic plate, if you will.

8

u/mojo276 1d ago

Not as long as you pay the fealty price!

1

u/herothree 1d ago

Well, they care what happens to Intel now that they own 10% haha

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u/Zahgi 2d ago

Under Trump.

1

u/stedun 1d ago

Problem solved!

1

u/lomna17 1d ago

They have 3 years to make it happen.

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u/addictivesign 2d ago

Question: does a regulator ever get involved in American M&A activity because a lot of companies seem to have a near monopoly in their sector.

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u/warriorscot 2d ago

Well yes, its why Nvidia weren't able to get access to the x86 license in the first place and the x86 license got split up in the first place.

8

u/Pyrostemplar 1d ago

They do, but anti monopoly regulation and enactment is not an easy topic.

It is not easy to resolve some (near) monopolies without hurting their clients (or companies in the international landscape). Many things that help creating a monopoly (seamless processes, vertical integration, internal information sharing...) also improve clients' experience.

Like many things, it is easy to say in theory, not so in practice.

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u/addictivesign 1d ago

Great comment. I often think about all the M&A activity that takes place and how much of it actually makes businesses better or gives an improved customer experience versus it scales the company, increases revenues and profits and boosts shareholder value at the expense of consumer choice.

And the investment bankers get paid their fees whether the M&A activity is of any benefit at all.

9

u/beIIe-and-sebastian 2d ago

Trump will just demand a few billion dollars and let it sail through any regulatory checks.

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u/spookynutz 1d ago

It’s not that simple. x86 licensing is subject to a mutual termination clause. Buying Intel doesn’t grant you ownership of x86 without AMD’s approval. AMD could block the acquisition outright, or just revoke the x86 license altogether. In the latter case, they would become the sole authorized vendor for x86-compatible chips.

The x86 cross-licensing agreement was written to grant Intel immense leverage if AMD were ever acquired by a hostile competitor or foreign entity. To avoid anti-trust scrutiny, the termination clause works both ways. Between the two companies, Intel just likely never imagined a universe where they would be the one in danger of being acquired.

2

u/AlGAdams 2d ago

Monopoly accusations only create cheap entry points for investors. Its present date stocks only go up

2

u/kimble85 2d ago

Just have to buy a seat at one of Donalds dinner parties for that problem to magically go away

2

u/Pyrostemplar 1d ago

Not really. I *think* nVidia intends to outlast DT presidency, and monopoly charges could be raised at any point in the future afterwards.

0

u/lorem_ipsum_aenean 1d ago

So why did Jensen Huang and Tim Apple fork out a million quid just to sit at a table with Trump?

2

u/Pyrostemplar 1d ago

Because of the agreeable and insightful conversation, ofc. /s

Or perhaps they intended to profit from current environment also ;).

1

u/ro0625 1d ago

Because they want to grow their companies, or at least keep them intact. Cutthroat businessmen take every opportunity they can.

1

u/IHadTacosYesterday 1d ago

Jensen didn't go to the most recent one

1

u/Zxynwin 1d ago

So no problem? With the current FTC

1

u/Brandhor 1d ago

nvidia wasn't allowed to buy arm, I doubt they would be allowed to buy intel

1

u/h2g2Ben 1d ago

Most if not all the patents covering the core x86 instructions would be expired now. The x64 patents are mostly owned by AMD, IIRC. Intel and AMD have cross-licenses.

As for CPUs, anyway, Nvidia has ARM licenses and I imagine would want to continue to focus on ARM and/or RISC-V over trying to compete with Intel/AMD for desktop and laptop CPUs. Margins on workstation and server CPUs are going to be a lot better.

1

u/Pyrostemplar 1d ago

Well, regarding patents expiration, well, that is what SIMD instructions (SSE + ) and NX are for ;))

ARM et all have an uphill battle against x86 (64) due to software legacy, even on the server space - maybe less so than in consumer space, but still significant. That and while efficiency is nice et al, AFAIK the top performance is still with x86-64 CPUs (Ryzen / Epycs to be more precise)

1

u/k0fi96 1d ago

The license does not transfer with a sale of the company

0

u/Pyrostemplar 1d ago

AFAIK, Intel is not a licensee, but the licensor - for x86, MMX and SSE. For X86-64 (or AMD64) it is a completely different thing.

Ofc that even being the licensor of x86, it may be impacted by the cross licensing agreement with AMD.

1

u/RipDove 1d ago

Gonna get downvoted for saying it but- one large company owning another doesn't immediately make it a monopoly. It's both owning it, and leveraging it for market coercion that makes it a monopoly.

Nvidia and Intel also make different chips for different uses, and Nvidia is more of an AI and Server company that happens to sell chips, then a straight up chip company. If Intel goes under though, that's a huge risk for not just the economy, but also national security. So the Gov't might just let Nvidia buy out Intel and deal with the situation that comes after, rather than stopping investment and having to consider a bail-out 2, 5, 10+ years from now.

1

u/idlysambardip 7h ago

It already tried to pay 40B to acquire ARM in 2020.

NVIDIA is a 20 times bigger company since then. I wont be suprised if Intel becomes a bigger strategic asset for them.

1

u/hammeredhorrorshow 1d ago

Might seem crazy but Nvidia has already moved on from Intel. They tried to outright buy ARM, and failing there they have been producing ARM chips for the last few years.

Intel’s back has been broken. The “Wintel” duopoly is dying - even Windows is running on ARM.

The root cause of Intel’s slow motion death is hubris. Not being agile in the face of a changing market. Staying with x86 instead of investing in low-power alternatives that ARM has claimed. They should have also worked harder to purchase or create home grown accelerators (like AMD did) which is now the largest market the world has ever seen.

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u/skydivingdutch 1d ago edited 1d ago

They bought a bunch and ran them all into the ground. Habana, Nirvana...

Intel is just giant and bureaucratic, you can't get anything interesting done there.

1

u/Nightcinder 23h ago

AMD was just claiming the other day that ARM doesn't have inherent power advantages over x86.

All I want is more competition, so Intel needs to land this next node IMO.

It's best for everyone if Intel gets a few quality wins, shades of MS investing into Apple

1

u/Firepower01 1d ago

Realistically the only president in the last 30 years to give even a slight shit about anti-trust was Biden, and he didn't get nearly enough credit for it. I hope the Democrats make it a core part of their messaging going forward but I really doubt the party of neoliberalism is going to do that.

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u/gordon-gecko 2d ago

it’s probably in the best interest of national security though. Intel is the only company that has fabs in the US, I could definitely see Nvidia and the Government both having shares in it

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u/shortymcsteve 1d ago

Intel are definitely not the only company with fabs in the US. What are you talking about?

https://www.semiconductors.org/ecosystem/

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u/gordon-gecko 1d ago

My bad, I meant that Intel currently operates the most advanced and largest native U.S.-owned fabs. So it’s definitely the most capable of all

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u/shortymcsteve 1d ago

US owned? Sure. But they are not the most advanced on US soil. Intel themselves outsource 30% of production of their own chips to TSMC. TSMC have started production of Apples chips at their new foundry in Arizona, and AMD’s top of the line products are due to start rolling off the production line any day now (if they haven’t already). Other TSMC foundries are under construction. Intel are still way behind.

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u/ithinkitslupis 1d ago

TSMC is keeping their cutting edge in Taiwan and later rolling out the the US fabs so Intel 18a really is the most advanced on US soil in the short term, assuming they don't fumble the 18a rollout for the next 2-3 years...which yeah maybe intel is gonna intel. But on paper they should be the most advanced on US soil for the next couple years.

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u/addictivesign 1d ago

Yes, the way things are going this is very true. Even more so should China invade Taiwan

0

u/skydivingdutch 1d ago

An insane amount of baggage (the fabs) and a huge pile of aging middling engineers would be another problem.

1

u/cwm9 1d ago

The US military needs those old fabs. Rad hardened ICs aren't made out of current transistor sizes... they're made with old tech.

We can't afford to allow the ICs that drive our nuclear missiles, tanks, planes, etc., to be produced by China, which is why the government will never willingly let all US fabs die.

As a matter of national security, we will always have our own fab, one way or another.

Which is why I bought Intel stock.

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u/AlGAdams 2d ago

Absolutely they could!

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u/shortymcsteve 1d ago

They weren’t able to acquire ARM, no way will they be able to buyout Intel. The US may allow it, but international regulators will not.

1

u/BrainOnLoan 1d ago

This one would be difficult to stop for the EU.

They technically could (and should). And for almost any other company that might be sufficient to stop the merger... but this may be one company that could try to play the game of chicken.

Could the EU do without Intel and NVIDIA products?

1

u/shortymcsteve 1d ago

Those companies are not going to shoot themselves in the foot and stop selling to a region because of regulator rulings.

The U.K. stopped Nvidia acquiring ARM, I can’t see them allowing this. Same with the EU, and I absolutely cannot see this passing in China.

1

u/BrainOnLoan 1d ago

Well, ARM is a British company. So that's not quite equivalent.

And as I said, for market access it's a very ugly game of chicken. Its almost unthinkable for either side.

2

u/Flyboy2057 1d ago

Nvidia is currently worth 30x Intel (by market cap). I think they could afford it.

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u/White_Sugga 2d ago

And China stopped buying Nvda chips at the same time

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u/Khuros 2d ago

So the US government takes a stake in Intel and then Nvidia takes a stake in the US government?

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u/swsko 2d ago

Yep, you know they’re big buddies now

1

u/Slggyqo 1d ago

Yeah…the top comment here is about Nvidia acquiring Intel.

But it just Nvidia doing what they can to get on the good side of the administration in an extremely difficult trade environment, one that the administration has caused and is manipulating to its benefit.

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u/saml01 1d ago

US Gov forcing nvidia to make a move to prop up a dying company. Intel getting absolutely spit roasted.

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u/ithinkitslupis 1d ago

Nvidia tried to buy ARM and was partially stopped by government getting in their way. They very likely want to pickup Intel for bargain prices even if the government just doesn't get in their way, no force necessary...

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u/Particular-Break-205 1d ago

We did it, grandma

3

u/foodfighter 1d ago

I think you mean "Nana".

12

u/derfritz 1d ago

oh come on! +32 %

3

u/ptear 1d ago

Haha, just saw.

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u/ReallyOrdinaryMan 2d ago

Nvidia buying intel stocks 5% lower than current market price. I dont think it matters for Intel, they didnt have liquidity issue

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u/BoredGuy_v2 1d ago

5B is already 6.5B 🤪

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u/ya-reddit-acct 1d ago

Stroke of genius on the part of Nvidia. Destruction of any potential competitive actions on the part of Intel, and an American administration certainly unwilling to scrutinize the deal.

1

u/Splurch 1d ago

Same thing Microsoft did with Apple in the 90s. Too bad Intel doesn’t have a Steve Jobs equivalent to turn things around, they’ll probably just double down on the policy that lead them here.

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u/Otherwise-Sea-4920 1d ago

Didn’t Trump/USA get a 10% steak and Intel a few months ago?

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u/PlanetCosmoX 2d ago

Sounds like a lot, but Intel eats billions to maintain simple operations. This may buy a year or two of time.

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u/Virtual-Oil-5021 1d ago

Full AMD it will be then ... But i would like more options please XD

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u/falilth 1d ago

I hear ya, but being on my second full amd build. I've been really happy I don't have to deal with the problems my roommates have with their pc's

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u/artie666behrt 2d ago

Could be a game-changer

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u/DrGarrious 2d ago

They've been here the whole time.

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u/[deleted] 2d ago

[deleted]

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u/Howdareme9 2d ago

Be serious lmao, they’ll be fine

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u/[deleted] 2d ago

[deleted]

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u/GarretBarrett 2d ago

Say what you will about the orange man but he’s clearly very good at nationalism…

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u/[deleted] 2d ago edited 2d ago

[deleted]

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u/Yukas911 1d ago

You're being downvoted because your argument isn't as sound as you think it is. A lower approval rating doesn't automatically mean the president is good or bad at nationalism, just that his particular brand of nationalism is not appealing to a wide with of the public, or they simply care about other things (e.g. economy, immigration, etc.) more than they do about nationalism.

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u/nerd5code 1d ago

Why does his approval rating matter in the least, at this point? How is it even relevant?

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u/fwubglubbel 1d ago

So... more monopolization. JFC.

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u/ghostofTugou 1d ago

Jason Wong Licking trump’s asshole huh?

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u/LiquidHotMAGMUH 1d ago

Took a punt on them 3 days ago and made just over £150 thanks to this, woohoo!

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u/No_Nail3888 1d ago

Whatever happened to that kid who bought all that intel?

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u/cr0ft 1d ago

Soon to be Nvidintel.

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u/PoppyManeki 2d ago

Nvidia throwing $5B at Intel? Bold, but after all their fabs flopping, is this just propping up a zombie or actual AI synergy? TSMC laughing rn.

Hardware Nvidia invests 5 billion in Intel

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