Jul 14, 2020 11:17:00

Softbank considers selling Arm

by

MIKI Yoshihito

The SoftBank Group is considering selling Arm, a semiconductor design company known for its ARM architecture , the Wall Street Journal reported.

SoftBank Explores Sale or IPO for Chip Designer Arm Holdings-WSJ
https://www.wsj.com/articles/softbank-explores-options-for-chip-designer-arm-holdings-11594672437

SoftBank hires Goldman Sachs to explore sale options for Arm: Sources
https://www.cnbc.com/2020/07/13/softbank-hires-goldman-sachs-to-explore-sale-options-for-arm-sources.html

SoftBank mulls sale of Arm Holdings, could Apple be a potential buyer?-9to5Mac
https://9to5mac.com/2020/07/13/arm-holdings-sale-rumor/

Arm is the world's largest semiconductor design company, which is closely related to the world's largest companies such as Apple, Samsung and Qualcomm. For example, Apple has adopted an ARM-based processor for the iPhone since 2006, and announced in 2020 that it will also adopt an ARM processor for the Mac.

SoftBank Group acquired such Arm in 2016. The acquisition cost was an enormous amount of about 3.3 trillion yen, but President Masayoshi Son said, ``With the era of the Internet of Things (IoT) era, the expansion of arm-designed semiconductors incorporated in various devices is expected So, it makes sense for a long-term strategy,' he said, saying that the acquisition amount was '¥3 trillion.'

Masayoshi Son, 'Taka is 3 trillion yen' in the amount of acquisition, unknown area, foresight or reckless (1/3 page)-SankeiBiz
https://www.sankeibiz.jp/business/news/160720/bsj1607200500002-n1.htm

Although SoftBank Group paid a huge amount to acquire Arm, local time July 13, 2020, SoftBank Group considered multiple options such as full or partial sale of Arm, IPO etc. Was reported. According to Informed Wall Street Journal, Arm's sale was with Goldman Sachs's advice and is still in the early stages of consideration.

by Chie Kawano

It is reported that the reason why the SoftBank Group is making such studies is due to the “business malfunction”. In January 2020, a series of poor investment businesses were reported, such as the failure of the coworking space service startup WeWork at the IPO and the withdrawal of the dog walking agency service Wag .

Point out that SoftBank continues to withdraw from startups due to investment failures-GIGAZINE

by MIKI Yoshihito

The SoftBank Group's telecommunications business division is steadily growing profits, but the value of global companies invested by SoftBank Vision Fund, an investment fund under the group, has declined across the board, and in May 2020 the SoftBank Group It has even been described as 'a large deficit since its foundation'.

Large deficit since SoftBank G was founded, '15 of the investee companies will go bankrupt' (My Navi News)-Yahoo! News
https://news.yahoo.co.jp/articles/eaa239bc026da43053a0a6d8d94b991f0963ac7b

The strategy that the SoftBank Group has launched in response to such a difficult situation is the sale of assets. In March 2020, the SoftBank Group announced that it would sell up to 4.5 trillion yen in assets to acquire its own shares and reduce its debt, increasing its cash on hand.

SoftBank G sells 4.5 trillion yen in assets-up to 2 trillion yen in treasury stock acquisition-Bloomberg
https://www.bloomberg.co.jp/news/articles/2020-03-23/Q7MR2JT0AFBA01

Considering the sale of Arm is also seen as part of the asset sale strategy. Arm had just announced a plan to 'transfer the IoT department to SoftBank' on July 8, 2020.

Arm announces that it will transfer its IoT department to Softbank-GIGAZINE