IBM: Please, take our chip unit. We'll give you $1.5 BEEELLION

[unhappycamper]

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/10/20/ibm_set_to_palm_off_chip_unit/

IBM: Please, take our chip unit. We'll give you $1.5 BEEELLION
By Eddie Pacey, 20 Oct 2014

Big Blue is going to become slightly less Big and Blue by paying Global Foundries $1.5bn to take on its chip-making business, according to multiple media reports, as the giant's retreat from hardware continues following the transfer of the X86 server business to Lenovo.

Bloomberg and others reported an IBM statement saying it is going to make a "major business announcement" today, 20 October. It will also make its third quarter earnings statement earlier than usual, before the close of business instead of after it.

~snip~

IBM's Power chip-making business has a foundry in East Fishkill, New York. The Power architecture is being licensed and IBM is moving to an ARM-like CPU design licensing model. AMD spun out Global Foundries in 2009 and it is based in Santa Clara.




IBM's East Fishkill semiconductor plant.

~snip~

The business is losing up to $1.5bn a year and, while Global Foundries wanted the unit's intellectual property and engineering skills, it did not want the losses, hence the compensatory payment.

[roamer65]

1. The future is Linux on Intel, virtualized on VMware.