Intel has identified potential investors in its subsidiary Altera

Under Intel’s previous leadership in the person of former CEO Patrick Gelsinger, the sale of the Altera subsidiary was not particularly advanced; preference was given to finding investors and going public. Now Intel has already decided on potential buyers of part of Altera shares; by the end of January they should formulate their proposals.

Image Source: Intel

At least, this information is published by Bloomberg with reference to its own sources. It is not a fact that the sale will take place at all, but among the potential investors currently mentioned are mainly institutional investors such as Apollo Global Management, Bain Capital, Francisco Partners and Silver Lake Management. The American company Lattice Semiconductor, which competes with Altera, can be considered an exception, but it is interested in purchasing the entire Intel subsidiary, although it does not have enough funds for this.

Transaction options range from a 20% to 30% stake in Altera to a full sale. Based on current offers, the company’s capitalization can be estimated at $9 to $12 billion, which is noticeably less than the $17 billion that Intel paid for Altera’s assets in 2015. Lattice has a capitalization of about $8 billion, so to gain control of Altera it will need a partner from financial circles. Intel’s interim management last week made it clear that Altera wants to decide the fate of its assets using a scheme reminiscent of financing IMS Nanofabrication. This division of Intel for the production of photo masks for the production of chips has been 20% owned by Bain Capital since June 2023, and later 10% of its shares went to the Taiwanese company TSMC. Thus, the assets of IMS Nanofabrication were valued at $4.3 billion.