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back to article EU, China may demand concessions for Qualcomm's $39bn Dutch chip plant slurp

The $39bn acquisition of Dutch chip company NXP is central to Qualcomm's strategy to expand its Internet of Things and connected car activities, getting to scale more quickly than it could through in-house developments alone, even with its renowned engineering teams. But it may face obstacles in the European Union, according to …

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  1. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge

    Higher license fees?

    Is the Pope a catholic. QC have to fund their legal disputes somehow.

    I happen to think that this purchase is a bit risky given the recent judgements against QC, UNLESS... NXP has some key IP that they can throw back in the face of Apple etc.

    If they do that then there will be even more lawsuits flying around but it may satisfy Wall St.

    3 1 Reply
  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Off topic but worth a laugh as some BBC journo has written this nonsense:

    "A 64-bit processor can handle vastly more data at once - four billion times as much - as a 32-bit processor, which can help make it faster in use."*

    Why this is complete bollocks ? Discuss

    * source:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-40172019

    6 1 Reply
    1. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Rory must be on holiday

      he ususally puts his name to pieces. At least then you get some warning that complete bollocks is to follow.

      4 1 Reply
      1. Mage Silver badge
        Reply Icon

        Re: Rory must be on holiday

        Sounds like Stephen Fry,

        4 0 Reply
    2. Anonymous Coward
      Reply Icon
      Anonymous Coward

      Well it isn't complete bollocks.. A 64bit system would be faster than a pure 32 bit system (without extensions) for eg when crossing the address boundary on paper. Whether this confers any practical benefit could be argued as a different matter. It does say "can" be faster after all.

      0 0 Reply
      1. Anonymous Coward
        Reply Icon
        Anonymous Coward

        >Well it isn't complete bollocks..

        Well this bit is, "can handle vastly more data at once - four billion times as much"

        0 0 Reply
  3. Mage Silver badge

    Qualcomm buying NXP.

    Should Not Be Allowed.

    OTH look at all the companies Amazon has eaten.

    These corporate acquisitions go beyond synergy, scaling up etc, to simply extort customers.

    4 0 Reply
  4. MT Field

    It buys them political clout in Europe. Also it allows them to ransack NXP's catalog of _clever stuff_ and slash expensive things like staff.

    0 0 Reply
  5. Mage Silver badge

    buys them political clout in Europe

    How?

    NXP is the spun off Philips Semiconductor.

    Qualcomm only regards product as a vehicle to get royalties. They only want the ex Philips RF IP.

    Any European staff will be laid off.

    Only chips with ability to charge a % on final product for royalty will be kept, and only far east production. Likely ANY remaining NXP chips in production will be licensed to highest Asian bidder.

    So there will be zero NXP European jobs and production. Possibly no NXP chips at all after a couple of years. It's about eating the real RF IP. I've seen it before with Qualcomm acquisitions!

    Qualcomm has no interest in $1.50 ARM cortex or car radio ICs.

    0 0 Reply
  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    >> I've seen it before with Qualcomm acquisitions!

    https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualcomm#Acquisitions

    Emotions aside could you give examples?

    Can't see these being made royalty businesses. You also seem to be vastly overvaluing nxp rf ip if you think it alone is worth $37 bn. Those private equity owners would have milked it dry if this were true.

    Qualcomm do not look to be just a royalty business so I'm curious how you come to this conclusion given the vast number of Snapdragon and atheros wifi chips they sell.

    0 0 Reply
  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    4 billion times the data is indeed correct!

    Actually the 4 billion time number as much is INDEED CORRECT!

    2^32 power is 4 294 967 296 and 2^64 is 18 446 744 073 709 551 616

    which is four billion times as much data and/or memory access than

    what a 32 bit processor can handle!

    Unlike other rags, The Register has got it right!

    0 0 Reply

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