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

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

#81
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…

By buying ARM the owner gets control over an architecture that many describe as "the future of computing". That's much more valuable than whatever money ARM makes.

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

#82
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> one of our few “unicorns” “There are currently 37 private $1b+ businesses headquartered in the UK—a further 14 have exited, whilst 2 are no longer active 13 UK companies became unicorns in H1 2021—the largest concentration of new unicorns to date” from: https://www.beauhurst.com/research/unicorn-companies/

True and really it’s not a Unicorn as it’s been public before. You inspired me to have a look at how many “Unicorns” are in the US for comparison. Depending on source it’s between about 400-480 in the US. So about 12x as many with about 4.8x the population.

Or about 12x as many with 11x GDP.

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

#83
post #55

Hopefully it will end back on the LSE, there was much lamenting here in the UK when SoftBank acquired them. They are one of the UKs biggest tech success, one of our few “unicorns”. For them to be be back on the LSE it would be a good signal of strength in UK tech. I wouldn’t be surprised if there is some lobbying going on behind the scenes from the UK government to try and ensure it happens. Some strategic tax brakes…

> one of our few “unicorns” “There are currently 37 private $1b+ businesses headquartered in the UK—a further 14 have exited, whilst 2 are no longer active 13 UK companies became unicorns in H1 2021—the largest concentration of new unicorns to date” from: https://www.beauhurst.com/research/unicorn-companies/

A lot of these seem to be consumer retail, e-commerce or housing related which says a lot about the UK economic landscape. Hardly the kind of company ARM would want to be swimming amongst.

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

#84
post #3

>ARM to IPO I'll be looking to pick up some shares as a long-term investment. I think ARM is one of the best things to happen to computing, and anything that threatens the x86 monoculture/hegemony is a good thing in my view.

Honestly at this point, any big tech IPO is just a license to print money.

The printer will start to run out of paper in a few months.

The companies that have their own invoice printer will “win”, the others will suffer.

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

#85

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.

A: "we grew to billions of dollars without ripping off our customers"

B: "it is a failure as a business. If you employed underhand tactics you could be even bigger!"

This is the phylosophy that gives us DRM on cars, 100 page lisence agreement with TVs, and fraud on wallstreet.

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

#86
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a Brexit anxiety thing. If a big boy like ARM goes public in London the PM can wave the flag on TV and say we're world class.

It is important with or without brexit.

The most important thing is where are the jobs. Where it lists is of minor concern, except for people desperate for "Brexit wins".

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

#87
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…

By buying ARM the owner gets control over an architecture that many describe as "the future of computing". That's much more valuable than whatever money ARM makes.

And if that control becomes too tight, RISC-V takes it place.

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

#88
post #27

This sounds super dumb - but given their acquisition was blocked, would Nvidia be stopped from simply buying the majority of shares at IPO? To be clear I'm not suggesting this will happen or not, I'm just curious if it would be allowed?

That would be considered a “cute move” and something like that would put Nvidia and some investment bankers in hot water.

Even if they bought a controlling amount of shares in public markets that would be subject to regulation.

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

#89

if they IPO can Nvidia buy a ton of shares and indirectly buy Arm?

Not easily. Trying to gain a controlling stake in a public company triggers regulatory involvement.

I'm still unclear why Nvidia would want to control Arm. If they wanted an architecture they could extend as they wished, they can use RISC-V (which they are already doing in a small way).

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

#90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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. What incentive would Nvidia have to develop new ARM features that would assist competitors in competing with them? The Fujitsu's A64FX Processor for example somewhat competes with Nvidia datacenter GPUs. What incentive would Nvidia have to continue to develop the Arm Scalable Vector Extension? The only good thing from this sale would be the pivot to RISC-V.

Be aware that Apple is a co-founder of ARM and probably has some perpetual license to the IP. They don't need ARM at all at this point.
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