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Intel has a new major shareholder. The entry of the Japanese Softbank Group also brings the ailing chip giant very welcome money. (archive picture)
Keystone
The struggling chip company Intel is getting a billion-euro cash injection from Japan. The technology group Softbank is buying Intel shares worth two billion dollars, as the companies announced.
The purchase price of 23 dollars per share is slightly below the closing price on Monday. Intel shares rose by more than five percent in after-hours trading following the announcement.
In regular trading on Monday, it had previously lost a good 3.6 percent in value. One possible trigger was a report by the financial service Bloomberg, according to which the US government is negotiating a ten percent stake in Intel.
It was also reported that Intel was considering providing the government with shares in return for billions in subsidies that were promised to the company during President Joe Biden's term of office. Intel has received pledges of around eight billion dollars under the then US law to support the chip industry. Together with military projects, this would be just under eleven billion dollars - roughly the amount that ten percent of Intel could cost on the market.
Intel once dominated the semiconductor market, but has been struggling with problems for years. Graphics card specialist Nvidia has conquered a leading position, particularly in the business with chips for artificial intelligence. Intel is also under greater pressure in its traditional business with PC processors and chips for data centers.
Softbank, led by billionaire Masayoshi Son, is currently expanding its US activities. Among other things, the group is involved in the "Stargate" project together with the ChatGPT developer OpenAI, which aims to build gigantic data centers for artificial intelligence. Softbank also owns a majority stake in chip designer Arm, whose technology powers practically all smartphones and tablet computers.
19.08.2025, 06:39
