Intel to acquire wireless operations from Infineon for $1.4 billion

Infineon, the German chipmaker, has announced that it has consented to sell the company’s wireless division to Intel, the global leader in silicon innovations, for a sum of $1.4 billion. Acquisition of Infineon’s wireless will allow the US-based manufacturer of electronic chips to enhance its position in the smartphone market. Quoting a statement issued by Infineon on Monday, an online report says that the cash-only deal is anticipated to be finalized during the first quarter of 2011. According to Intel, the wireless unit of Infineon will continue to be a separate business of the company. Paul Otellini, Intel CEO, said that the acquisition of the wireless operations of Infineon will reinforce the second pillar of their computing policy – connectivity to the Internet. According to Otellini, this would allow them to proffer a better portfolio of products to the customers. It may be noted here that on Friday, three people in the know of things had revealed to the news agency Reuters regarding the possibility of Intel and Infineon signing an agreement on the future of the wireless business of Infineon in the subsequent few days. The acquisition of Infineon’s wireless operations comes just a little over a week since the US chipmaker had announced its decision to acquire McAfee Inc for a whopping sum of $7.7 billion. Thus far, McAfee is said to be the biggest acquisition by Intel. Meanwhile, the shares of Infineon dropped 0.9 per cent at €4.61 ($5.86) in Frankfurt at closing on Friday, recovering some of the losses made by the German chipmaker following Intel’s warning that the firms revenue during the third quarter of 2010 would prove to be deficient of its own estimations owing to poor consumer demand for personal computers. The shares of Intel, however, closed more or less at the same level at $18.37.