Texas Instruments will buy National Semiconductor for $6.5 billion

CHIPMAKER Texas Instruments (TI) will buy National Semiconductor for $6.5 billion, subject to closing conditions.

The all-cash deal will see TI pay $25 per share for National Semiconductor. It will gain National Semiconductor's analogue semiconductor business, which is one of TI's primary areas of interest, making up nearly 50 per cent of its revenue.

TI said the acquisition is all about "strength and growth" and that it will end up with an extensive analogue chip portfolio, adding National Semiconductor's 12,000 analogue products to its existing catalogue of 30,000.

It will also bring in National Semiconductor's development team, resulting in a combined force that is 10 times the size of National Semiconductor's current employee base. National Semiconductor's fab facilities in Maine, Scotland and Malaysia will be kept as plants and run by TI.

TI claims it has a market share of 14 per cent for analogue semiconductors, bringing in $6 billion in 2010 alone. In contrast, National Semiconductor has a much smaller share of three per cent, bringing in $1.6 billion. The entire analogue semiconductors market was $42 billion last year. µ