Silicon Labs to sell unit to Skyworks for $2.75 billion
Silicon Laboratories has announced that it is to sell its infrastructure and automotive business to Skyworks Solutions in a deal worth $2.75 billion.
The move suggests that Silicon Labs is planning to focus on wireless chips for the smart home market.
The company has focused increasingly on the internet-of-things (IoT) market, in recent years, and has been selling wireless chips for smart home devices and winning a growing number of significant deals with manufacturers. It’s success in this space has been due, in part, to its including the different wireless standards that are currently being used in a single chip, so that these devices can be used across the various smart-home networks from the likes of Alphabet, Google and Amazon.
Silicon Labs is selling its power and isolation chips used in electric cars, among other products, as well as all the intellectual property and 350 employees for the products.
According to Reuters, Silicon Labs’ Chief Executive Tyson Tuttle said that IoT chips now made up about 60% of the company’s business, with revenue growing at more than 20% per year and required different customer bases and supply chains than was the case with the company’s automotive and infrastructure businesses.
Skyworks said that it hopes to use the acquisition to expand further into growing sectors including electric and hybrid vehicles, industrial and 5G wireless sectors and plans to fund the deal with a combination of cash and debt financing.
The deal is expected to close in the third quarter of 2021,