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SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

reuters.com

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Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#111

Post by Nokinside »

ksec wrote: post #64

It sort of make sense for Nvidia's shareholders. The initial offering for ARM was only worth $38.5bn, which was already expensive due to SoftBank initial purchase price and not wanting for a loss. But at Nvidia's peak this deal was worth " $87bn ". For a company that makes less than $2B in revenue and at best ~$300M in Operating Income. Remember this isn't something you can buy and milk the crap out of other market p…

As I understand it the value for Nvidia came from adding Nvidia GPU IP into the products that AMD sells to customers.

Nvidia would have expanded the market from their own products to licenses.

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#112

Post by einpoklum »

lunfard000 wrote: post #4
sekh60 wrote: post #2

Good, we need more players, not less.

I didn't like much this but having ARM in the hands of financial institution which doesn't have any motivation to invest in the technology doesn't seem any better (and probably doesnt understand/doesnt care about it). In the other hand, Nvidia have a good track record creating good products.

> Nvidia have a good track record creating good products.

And a bad track record of preventing interoperability and cross-vendor standardization, to lock customers in.

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#114

Post by klelatti »

lunfard00 wrote: post #18
zinekeller wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> And lots of arbitrarily software locking features to extract more money from different market segments. This is the cultural difference between ARM and Nvidia. ARM does care enough about their IP that you'll need to pay them for ARM's effort to develop their IP, but beyond that they will not restrict you unless it'll put ARM into legal trouble (basically export restrictions). Hey, you could get everything now with…

That is good for Samsung/Qualcomm/Mediatek/Apple, but let's be honest, it is a failure as a business. Despite of being used on pretty much 100% of all smartphones' SoC, they barely make any money. Also, their designs are lagging behind, M1 and probably Nuvia are example of that.

> but let's be honest, it is a failure as a business.

Obviously not true, but I can see how some might think this if their main comparators are companies that get to $1trn valuations in 30 years. Not every company can or should be a FAANG.

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#115

Post by MangoCoffee »

NortySpock wrote: post #9

Why will ARM succeed where MIPS faded into obscurity? (Well, relative obscurity. I see they are still used in media devices and cheap routers.) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/MIPS_Technologies

what are you talking about? ARM is every where used by all the tech companies.

ARM is on mobile, data center and desktop/laptop.

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#116

Post by ignoramous »

jsiepkes wrote: post #100
ksec wrote: post #64

It sort of make sense for Nvidia's shareholders. The initial offering for ARM was only worth $38.5bn, which was already expensive due to SoftBank initial purchase price and not wanting for a loss. But at Nvidia's peak this deal was worth " $87bn ". For a company that makes less than $2B in revenue and at best ~$300M in Operating Income. Remember this isn't something you can buy and milk the crap out of other market p…

If Activision/Blizzard is worth $65bn to Microsoft for it's IP then $84bn is still a steal for ARM?

Provided the ARM juggernaut is expected to streamroll Intel's business in the coming decade, this acquisition does make sense for Intel... this could be their Facebook+WhatsApp moment.

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#117

Post by samwillis »

ksec wrote: post #64

It sort of make sense for Nvidia's shareholders. The initial offering for ARM was only worth $38.5bn, which was already expensive due to SoftBank initial purchase price and not wanting for a loss. But at Nvidia's peak this deal was worth " $87bn ". For a company that makes less than $2B in revenue and at best ~$300M in Operating Income. Remember this isn't something you can buy and milk the crap out of other market p…

Wanted to see where your brilliant phrase "Riscy Silver Bullet" was from so had a google, I think you are trying to start a trend ;-)

> ksec 67 days ago

> The unwritten rule of HN:

> You do not criticise The Rusted Holy Grail and the Riscy Silver Bullet.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29422032

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#118

Post by fredoralive »

ClumsyPilot wrote: post #95
sanxiyn wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, ARM has SBSA standard, and it seems to work well.

Coupd anyone explain how this works, are we any closer to the dream of being able to boot generic Ubuntu image on a random ARM device like you can with x86?

It's a standard specification for ARM server hardware / memory maps / firmware / etc, so operating systems should be interchangeable on it. Doesn't have a specifically consumer orientated equivalent though.

Its a bit like the way you need more than an x86 CPU, you need an "IBM PC Compatible" system[1] with various buses and peripherals in the right memory locations, BIOS/UEFI firmware etc. for generic PC OSes to work. SBSA standardises something like an equivalent of an "IBM PC" for ARM Servers.

[1] Or whatever you would call it nowadays, as legacy BIOS booting is fading away modern systems might not count as that.

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#119

Post by klelatti »

ksec wrote: post #72
actuator wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have their profitability prospects taken a hit because of whatever happened at ARM China?

We dont know because Softbank no longer breaks out those number in 2018/2019. But they do give some insight into the level of growth so we could extrapolate from previous year or quarters. And generally speaking Softbank ( and ARM ) refuse to comment on anything about ARM China. But that is a good point, it is a potential risk or at least need to be mindful in its valuation.

FWIW Arm still files accounts in the UK (apparently for the Group).

https://find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk/c...

Latest is 2020/21. Profits down to £7m due to higher R&D and other expenses.

Re: SoftBank's Sale of Arm to Nvidia Collapses, Arm to IPO

#120

Post by martinald »

ccity88 wrote: post #103
drumhead wrote: post #61

If SoftBank want to maximize their return then they'd probably do best to list ARM in the US. There's no way they'd get the crazy valuations you seen on NASDAQ on the LSE. It's why so many UK tech companies IPO in New York. They don't seem to get particularly excited about tech in London.

That's because a lot of these ""tech"" companies are just other business models in disguise. My especially favourite are the unsustainable business model food delivery apps like Deliveroo and JustEat, or the retail apps that are classed as tech for some reason like online consumer brands such as Victorian Plumbing and whisky seller Artisanal Spirits. It's clear to me that IPO's are no longer about long term equity, a…

JustEat isn't unsustainable. They are profitable (pretty wildly so until they started offering their own delivery riders to grow to outlets which don't have drivers -- which has started hitting margins).

Deliveroo much less sustainable.

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