South Korean semiconductor supplier SK Hynix has completed the first phase of its acquisition of Intel's SSD and NAND flash memory manufacturing businesses. China has officially approved the deal, and SK Hynix will pay Intel more than $7.000 billion for the acquisition, which will soon operate under the name Solidigm.
This sector will be led by Rob Crooke, former senior vice president and general manager of Intel's non-volatile memory solutions group. Lee Seok-hee, the president and co-CEO of SK hynix, will take over as CEO. Solidigm is expected to be based in San Jose, California.
SK Hynix delves into SSDs
The global agreement is valued at 9.000 million dollars, and consists of a project divided into two stages. The first stage, which has now been completed, includes the transfer of Intel's China-based semiconductor manufacturing plant, along with some employees and intellectual property, to SK Hynix.
The second stage will not be completed before 2025. Intel will be using some of WAFER's design and intellectual property to produce NAND wafers and workstations at the Dalian factory. When the deal closes, Intel will stop producing NAND flash memory. Some restrictions from China will result in some price caps on finished products and components, as well as supply expansion guarantees for enterprise-class PCIe and SATA components for the next five years.
So we can't expect a big change in production and organization from Intel or Sk Hynix for at least three years. It will be then when we begin to notice the changes that SK Hynix will implement when it has the production of the SSD that Intel manufactures for now.
Source: TechRadar
