BongoBob Posted July 25, 2006 Share Posted July 25, 2006 http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=10190 July 24, 2006 Confirmed: AMD To Acquire ATI Officials from computer processor manufacturer Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) have confirmed rumors that the company will acquire graphics chip maker ATI Technologies in a cash and stock deal worth $5.4 billion. The company indicated that the acquisition had been made in order to increase its presence in the commercial and mobile computing segments, as well as the consumer electronics market. The company now plans to market “customer-centric platforms” in 2007 using integrated technologies from both companies. Under the terms of the transaction, AMD will acquire all of the outstanding common shares of ATI for a combination of $4.2 billion in cash and 57 million shares of AMD common stock, based on the number of shares of ATI common stock outstanding on July 21st, 2006. AMD will pay $20.47 per share for each share of ATI, marking a 24 percent premium over ATI's closing stock price of $16.56 on Nasdaq on Friday. The consideration for each outstanding share of ATI is comprised of $16.40 of cash and 0.2229 shares of AMD common stock. AMD anticipates it will finance the cash portion of the transaction with a combination of cash and new debt. AMD has obtained a $2.5 billion term loan commitment from Morgan Stanley Senior Funding which, together with combined existing cash, cash equivalents and short term investments balances of approximately $3.0 billion, provides the funding for the transaction. Although rumored since May of this year analysts had questioned the financial and strategic wisdom of AMD acquiring ATI outright. Additionally, the move could have important repercussions for the games industry, with the question of continued ATI support for Intel chipsets currently unclear. The ramifications for ATI rival NVidia’s support for AMD chipsets is also now in question. The acquisition though is not expected to have any effect on the use of ATI technology in the Xbox 360 and Wii – both of which use IBM PowerPC processors. “ATI shares our passion and complements our strengths: technology leadership and customer centric innovation,” said AMD chairman and CEO Hector Ruiz. “Bringing these two great companies together will allow us to transcend what we have accomplished as individual businesses and reinvent our industry as the technology leader and partner of choice. We believe AMD and ATI will drive growth and innovation for the entire industry, enabling our partners to create differentiated solutions and empowering our customers to choose what is best for them.” “This combination means accelerated growth for ATI, and broader horizons for our employees,” said Dave Orton, president and CEO of ATI. “All of our product lines will benefit. Joining with AMD will enable us to innovate aggressively on the PC platform, and continue to invest significantly in our consumer business to stay in front of our markets.” This better not mean that I can't use my nVidia cards with AMD chips anymore anytime soon : | Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Tyrion Posted July 25, 2006 Share Posted July 25, 2006 Woo! My AMD 64 and Ati X800 video card shall become more powerful than you ever imagined. I just hope AMD will put out better video drivers than ATI did.. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TiE23 Posted July 25, 2006 Share Posted July 25, 2006 This better not mean that I can't use my nVidia cards with AMD chips anymore anytime soon : | That would probably not happen. It would be like Apple making the next iPod work for only the Mac to get people to switch. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crow_Nest Posted July 28, 2006 Share Posted July 28, 2006 AMD still insists on using NVIDIA chipsets for their motherboards, yay so we'll still be seeing more nForce chipsets being made for AMD CPUs. Hopefully ATI gets it right this time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RoxStar Posted July 29, 2006 Share Posted July 29, 2006 nVidia > ATI AMD > Intel ...so what's to happen to ATI? Will they sponsor obscure sporting events? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crow_Nest Posted July 29, 2006 Share Posted July 29, 2006 Hey, how come i never thought of that? Maybe we'll start seeing the ATI logo on Shumarer's car Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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