Intel acquired the manufacturer of programmable chips in 2015 for 17 billion
California’s tech focused private equity Silver Lake will acquire from Nasdaq-listed Intel Corporation a 51% of Altera, a manufacturer of FPGAs (field programmable gate arrays), on the ground of an enterprise value of 8.75 billion US Dollars (press release). The closing may take place in 2H25. Morgan Stanley & Co. LLC acted as financial advisor to Intel which delisted Altera from Nasdaq in 2015 with an all cash deal worth in the region of 17 billion (press release). The vendor will invest such fetched resources in solving its financial distress.
On 5 May, Monday, Raghib Hussain, the former President of Products and Technologies at Marvell Technology, will replace Sandra Rivera as ceo of Altera. Hussain previously co-founded cybersecurity company VPNet and Cavium, of which he was coo, and worked for Cisco and Cadence.
Lip-Bu Tan, Intel ceo, said: “Today’s [14 April, Monday] announcement reflects our commitment to increase focus, reduce our expense structure and strengthen our balance sheet. Altera continues to make progress in repositioning its product portfolio to participate in the fastest growing and most profitable segments of the FPGA market. We are grateful to Sandra for her strong leadership and lasting impact over her 25-year career at Intel and wish her continued success as she begins a new chapter. Raghib is an excellent executive whom we selected to lead the company based on her extensive industry experience and proven track record of success. We look forward to working with Silver Lake after the transaction closes, as their industry experience will help accelerate Altera’s efforts and unlock additional economic value for Intel.”
Kenneth Hao, chairman and managing partner of Silver Lake, added: “This investment represents a unique opportunity to invest in a leader of scale in advanced semiconductors. Raghib will help us to focus on strengthening Altera’s technology leadership position and artificial intelligence driven investments in emerging markets, such as edge computing and robotics. We look forward to working closely with Intel as a strategic partner that will continue to provide US-based foundry services and complementary customer engagement.”
Hussain concluded: “I am excited to lead Altera into its next chapter, and this milestone with Silver Lake continues the company’s journey to become the world’s number 1 FPGA solution provider. Altera is well positioned to build on its momentum and deliver revolutionary FPGA-based solutions that are shaping the future of AI-driven computing with the support of Silver Lake’s strong track record. I am grateful for the impact Sandra made and the team she has built as we begin the next phase of Altera’s growth.”
Altera provides market-leading, easy-to-use and easy-to-deploy programmable semiconductor solutions across a range of strategically important segments such as industrial, communications, data centre, and military, aerospace and government sectors, as well as emerging markets such as AI/edge and robotics. In FY2024, Altera generated revenues of 1.54 billion, GAAP gross margin of 361 million and GAAP operating loss of 615 million. Altera’s non-GAAP gross margin for FY2024 was 769 million and non-GAAP operating income was 35 million. Reconciliations between GAAP and non-GAAP measures are shown below.
