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SoftBank to put $8
billion ARM stake into its Vision Fund: FT
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 [March 08, 2017]
LONDON/ABU
DHABI (Reuters) - Japan's SoftBank is to place a roughly $8 billion
stake in ARM, the British chip designer it bought last year, into a
technology investment fund it has created with Saudi Arabia, the
Financial Times reported on Wednesday.
SoftBank, run by founder Masayoshi Son, bought ARM, Britain's most
valuable technology company, for $32 billion last year.
The FT cited two people close to the situation as saying SoftBank would
place 25 percent of ARM into its Vision Fund. It said the decision was
made as the fund was seeking to secure the backing of Mubadala, the Abu
Dhabi state-backed investment group, which wanted the Vision Fund to own
a portion of ARM.
The FT said the British government, which backed the initial takeover,
had been notified of the transaction and did not raise any concerns.
Softbank declined to comment.
Son and Saudia Arabia's sovereign wealth fund created the technology
investment fund that could grow as large as $100 billion and become a
kingpin in the high-tech industry.
Mubadala said in January that it was in talks with SoftBank to invest in
the fund. A source familiar with the talks told Reuters at the time that
Mubadala might invest between $10 billion and $15 billion, and that an
agreement could be signed in the following few weeks.
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People walk behind the
logo of SoftBank Corp in Tokyo December 18, 2014. REUTERS/Toru Hanai/File
Photo
On
Wednesday, a Mubadala spokesman told Reuters that the talks were continuing and
that the Abu Dhabi group hoped to resolve remaining issues in the next couple of
days.
The issues relate to structural and financial details of the investment as well
as aspects of the fund and Mubadala’s role in it, he said, declining to
elaborate or give a specific figure for the size of the investment.
“It will be a significant investment - we are working through it,” the spokesman
said, adding that an announcement was likely to be made around the middle of
next week.
(Reporting by Kate Holton in London and Stanley Carvalho in Abu Dhabi; Writing
by Andrew Torchia; Editing by Guy Faulconbridge and Jane Merriman)
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