Qualcomm is reportedly interested in acquiring Intel

A new report states that Qualcomm is interested in acquiring Intel and that the former company has approached Intel about the possible acquisition. This would make Qualcomm a much larger player in the industry than it already is. Details about the interest in buying Intel come from The Wall Street Journal (via The Verge and Yahoo! Finance) which cites unnamed sources. The report says that the deal was not a certainty and Intel has not agreed to any such proposal at this time.

There’s also no word on whether or not Intel would even be perceptive to the acquisition. It would undoubtedly be a massive deal for both parties. Intel’s shares recently closed up 3.3%, but it’s been struggling of late due to issues with its last two generations of chips having issues that resulted in the chips crashing. Intel also recently announced it would be cutting back staff by at least 15 percent as of last month. Qualcomm shares, meanwhile, recently fell 2.9 percent. Acquiring Intel and its chip designs could help boost its recent re-entry into the PC chip market.

Intel recently announced it would be spinning off its foundry business as an independent entity. This was just two days after it was reported Intel was seeking government help in more or less convincing US companies like Apple and NVIDIA to use Intel’s fabrication for their AI-based chip manufacturing.

Qualcomm acquiring Intel would probably need regulatory approval

Qualcomm buying Intel would be a massive acquisition. Even if it could benefit both companies, regulatory bodies might see this as handing Qualcomm too much power in the industry. It’s a deal that, even if Intel agreed to it, would likely draw the attention of the FTC over potential antitrust concerns. That being said, it would also be an acquisition of an American-owned company by another American-owned company. So it wouldn’t necessarily be out of the realm of possibility in terms of approval.

And yet, Microsoft’s acquisition of Activision Blizzard was also between two American-owned companies. And it still garnered tons of attention and pushback from regulators. This is all assuming things ever go that far for Qualcomm and Intel. As of right now all that’s been said is that Qualcomm was interested and approached Intel about that interest.

News of the acquisition proposal comes just a few weeks after it was reported that Qualcomm was interested in buying parts of Intel’s chip business. Specifically, its chip design department. Intel had reportedly been looking to shed some weight and offload parts of its business to save cash. Following a steep decline in its share prices that have fallen by about 57 percent this year.

Qualcomm recently laid off hundreds of employees

Reports of Qualcomm’s interest in buying Intel come at a time when it has just recently announced layoffs of hundreds of employees. The company said it would be laying around 226 employees later this year. Impacting staff at 16 facilities across the San Diego area.

This doesn’t necessarily have any ties to Qualcomm’s interest in buying Intel. However, it’s a move that Qualcomm is making that will help the company save some cash. Cash that be very useful in an Intel acquisition should things move forward.