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Texas Instruments Buys National Semiconductor For $6.5B
CWmike writes "Texas Instruments on Monday announced it has agreed to acquire semiconductor company National Semiconductor for $6.5 billion in an all-cash transaction. TI, which makes low-power chips, said it would combine its 30,000 analog products and advanced manufacturing capabilities with the offerings of National Semiconductor, which makes analog integrated circuits. The acquisition is subject to customary closing conditions, and is expected to close in six to nine months, the companies said in a joint statement. Look out, [chip maker name here]?"
So, does this mean that TI prices will be even higher than that of before?
is the sound of thousands of laser printers firing up, and spitting out epic number of resumes
Lawyers, MBA's, RIAA? A jedi fears not these things!
Dear valued customer,
I am excited to let you know that TI has signed a definitive agreement to purchase National Semiconductor, uniting two industry leaders that have a common commitment to solving your analog needs. I want to reinforce TI's commitment to you, our customer, as we merge our two companies.
This acquisition will allow us to address your analog needs with a product portfolio of unmatched breadth and depth. National's 12,000 products plus TI's 30,000 means more performance, power and packaging options when selecting the right ICs for your application. And we'll provide a common set of best-in-class online tools to make the selection and design process easier.
Our combined sales and applications team of 2,500 will be larger than any in the industry so we can provide more customers with greater face-to-face support than ever before.
Our manufacturing operations will offer more capacity to support your growth. TI's fabs and National's available capacity can enable higher production levels.
While both companies will operate independently pending the close, our goal thereafter is to make the integration process as seamless as possible. No requalification of products will be necessary since National's manufacturing sites will continue to be utilized. Part numbers from both companies will remain the same. There will be no obsolescence of products.
I'm excited about what the integration of our two companies will mean for you: an unmatched portfolio to meet your analog needs, an extensive sales and applications network to ease the design process, and manufacturing capacity to support your growth.
You can learn more about the acquisition at www.ti.com/acquire, including answers to frequently asked questions and video messages from TI leaders regarding the acquisition.
Thank you for choosing TI. I look forward to a great future together.
However the capabilities are also going up.
Relevant
Just like the TI calculators. Yep, those never go down in value, always the same price since the 90s.
I'd say the price points go back to the 1970s.
A shameless plug but you can get the functionality of several dedicated handheld calculators in a single app for your smartphone these days: Perpenso Calc. Scientific, statistics, business, hex and bill/tip. You can even cherry pick the functionality you want and only pay for the "calculators" you need. Handheld calculators are going to largely become a victim of the convergence/consolidation of digital devices. Far fewer people are going to need/want the standalone handheld calculator.
Like amazing A/D converters that can saturate an FPGA with data flow. Here's to hoping for a cheap, consumer SDR! :D ...
I'll just wait over there...
All rites reversed 2010
Real calculators are RPN anyway.
Sent from my PDP-11
Calculators real RPN are anyway.
That fixed you for there.
People in the industry know the difference between Nat. Semi., TI and NI. You must be referring to non-techies.
National Semi, although one of the big players and a significant innovator, has a history of getting into financial trouble. Texas Instruments is a more stable operation and has always given the impression that it was run by more sensible people. If the corporate cultures are compatible, I think this move is for the best.
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BAE Systems completes purchase of Fairchild Imaging.
"What's the use of a good quotation if you can't change it?" - Doctor Who
TI no longer keeps stock on many chips. When the distributors run out the factory sits and waits for the orders to come in. Some of these chips have lead times of 26 weeks, half a year! You're basically screwed and have to start bargaining with brokers.
Only the State obtains its revenue by coercion. - Murray Rothbard
First TI popularizes auto-tune and now he enters the power management technology industry with an almost seven billion dollar buyout? This guy is AMAZING!
... ...
-- Who keeps Windows in the labs?
-- We do!, we do!
(for those who don't know, the abomination known as LabVIEW)
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.
National had some the oldest fab equipment in the business. That place had equipment even China didn't want.
But you know what they say.
http://www.siliconvalleywatcher.com/mt/archives/2005/09/real_men_have_f.php
In GOD we trust, all others we monitor.
Now that they're purchasing National Semi, they can offer RPN calculators.
Win?
TI has $6.5 billion in cash lying around and we're wondering why our economy is in the shitter and where all the jobs are?
Corporate tax laws should be changed so they're taxed for wealth as well as income. Maybe they could put that money to work for something besides buying out the competition.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Am I the only one still shocked that analog is pulling in this kind of cash?
http://www.kubuntu.org/
Looks like the folks at National Semiconductor... (puts on sunglasses)... cashed in their chips.
YEEEEEEEAAAAHHHHH !
Genius 1 +
No folly is more costly than the folly of intolerant idealism. - Winston Churchill
What??? Are you serious? It's the other way around. National makes the cheapest, crappiest, volume parts around. They have some high end parts, but nothing that compares with the high precision parts from other semiconductor companies. Especially compare National to Linear or Analog Devices for quality.
That's going to be a hell of a lot of suitcases.
There's nothing wrong with Windows in the lab. You don't have to use LabVIEW. You can use any dev system you want, any language you prefer. Write FORTRAN code and compile it with the command line tools if that's what you like.
The danger here is that there aren't too many other chip makers. TI and National Semiconductor are definitely the biggest, and I can see TI building up a bit of a monopoly in some areas quickly, or at least increasing the profit margin. Perhaps we'll see some unknown chip maker rise in a few years to even the markt.
That's a lot of suitcases.
National has gone downhill since Robert Pease retired. If you don't know who Pease is, then you probably don't know much about analog electronics. Thats all I'm saying.
"Science flies us to the moon. Religion flies us into buildings." - Victor Stenger
Amen. I have a TI-83 circa 1996 and a TI-89 circa 1999, and I don't feel at a disadvantage at all compared to newer models. There are a few MINOR tweaks here and there, but overall they're still about the same critters as the old models.
That said, the fact that they don't change does bode well for students on a budget who want one off the used market. I kept mine because it's a gadget and I like gadgets (though I haven't turned them on in years), but it seems there's always college students dumping their old calculators off on pawn shops after they finish up. If you need one you can usually pick one up pretty cheap from those sources.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
Not sure if TI's can natively do RPN. If not, it's a shame. Once you get used to RPN, algebraic notion is quaint. I find it faster and easier to use.
All personal preference really. I perfectly understand RPN, and can use an HP calculator just fine, but I'm much faster on a TI-89. It's not something that's intrinsically better or worse - just different.
"People who think they know everything are very annoying to those of us who do."-Mark Twain
TI engineers leave to form Cyrix -> National Semiconductor acquires Cyrix -> Texas Instruments acquires National Semiconductor.
(note: Cyrix's empty husk was actually sold off by National circa 1998)
Challenge accepted. :-\
*shudder*
I eventually replaced most of our Labview hardware control software with RealBasic and later C#. I know some overly serious folks don't like those two, but they are *perfect* Labview replacements. You get the same "draw the interface and attach functions" approach but you can write actual code instead of drawing street maps. It did help that National Instruments documents their APIs very well, so rolling up the API declares was a breeze.
So... the government takes a chunk of their assets and that encourages TI to hire more people... how exactly?
In the relevant accounting/finance sense of the term, cash refers to not only piles of physical currency but also to some other highly liquid assets such as bank account balances.
I listen to both RIAA and non-RIAA stuff if I like the music, tangential business/politics nonwithstanding.
If it has a PLL; sorry no. SDR should have a wideband A/D converter and some filters. You flatten the lower bands and tune into the "mirror images" of signals above the top-range of the A/D converter's maximum sample rate instead of tuning.
All rites reversed 2010
Good luck making it talk to the "LabVIEW-supported" devices if you are not running Windows.
Contrary to the popular belief, there indeed is no God.