Electronics Japanese Softbank Group invests in US chip manufacturer Intel
The Japanese Softbank Group is investing in the struggling US chip manufacturer Intel, further strengthening its presence in the United States. Softbank is buying Intel shares worth two billion dollars, the company announced on Tuesday.
19.08.2025, 10:45
19.08.2025, 10:46
SDA
This will give Softbank a stake of around two percent in Intel. According to media reports, the US government is also considering investing in Intel to support it - with around ten percent.
The US company is lagging behind the competition, particularly when it comes to building chips for artificial intelligence (AI). Due to economic problems, Intel finally abandoned plans to build a chip factory in Magdeburg at the end of July. The semiconductor market is dominated by TSMC from Taiwan and Samsung from South Korea, with the US company Nvidia currently leading the way in terms of technology.
Softbank and Intel declared on Tuesday that the Japanese group's "strategic investment" reflects their conviction that modern semiconductor manufacturing and supply will expand in the USA and that Intel will play a "decisive role" in this. The head of Softbank, Masayohsi Son, has announced several investment projects in the USA since Donald Trump's return to the White House. These include a stake in the 500 billion dollar Stargate project, which aims to build huge data centers for AI in the USA. The US software company Oracle and the ChatGPT developer OpenAI are also involved.
At the beginning of August, US President Trump had called for the resignation of Intel CEO Tan due to his alleged closeness to China - after a meeting with the top manager a few days later, there was no more talk of this. Instead, there were initial reports of the state taking a stake in Intel.
