UK digital secretary Oliver Dowden starts national security probe into proposed Arm-Nvidia merger

The proposed sale of Arm to Nvidia looks a bit more tenuous today after UK digital secretary Oliver Dowden issued a Public Interest Intervention Notice (PIIN) indicating he may intervene in the sale on national security grounds. The disptach of the PIIN has kicked-off a further degree of scrutiny, with the Competition and …

[Dwarf]

Strong ARM'ed into it ?

Protecting ARM = good.

But ... does this mean that there is a national security concern about Nvidia, because they are used in a fair number of systems too.

[Jc (the real one)]

Did the UK government complain when ARM was bought by softbank, or don't they consider Japan a foreign country?

Jc

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

ARM (plc) owned by a bunch of banks, pension funds and sovereign wealth funds and ARM (private) owned by a single hedge fund backed by a bunch of banks, pensions, sovereign funds = what's the difference?

ARM owned by a single chip maker with an almost monopoly in some areas = concern

[I_am_not_a_number]

Agreed.

Softbank has a diverse portfolio of tech companies, which means it's less focussed on a specific sector and therefore (anti-)competitive behaviours.

To me, the quote below from Softbank was probably the main assurance to competition regulators, shortly after the Arm acquisition:

"..It is also intended that ARM will remain an independent business within SoftBank, and continue to be headquartered in Cambridge, UK..."

[Charlie Clark]

It is also intended that ARM will remain an independent business within SoftBank

Which we all knew was horse shit and why no one was surprised when it was sold on. Little point now in bolting the stable door…

[Mips]

Softbank

You may not have noticed but SoftBank do not bake silicon.

[steelpillow]

Really?

"We love their licensing model. Their open licensing model is absolutely one of the greatest licensing models out there"

Funny how Nvidia don't seem to be falling over themselves to adopt the ARM licensing model for their own proprietary technologies...

[Doctor Syntax]

Better late than never but better never five years late.

[Tron]

Bit late.

China will most likely block it. Owned by SoftBank (JP/KR) China can leverage access politically. Owned by a US company, Washington can cut off access to Chinese companies.

Incidentally, there are some bizarre issues involving the CEO of the Chinese unit of ARM.

[Yet Another Anonymous coward]

Re: Bit late.

But global geo-politcally speaking it's what Britain says that matters

[Tom 7]

Re: Bit late.

Only on the comedy circuit.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Bit late.

@Tron

"Owned by a US company, Washington can cut off access to Chinese companies"

Going by the sanctions that the U.S.A. have imposed on just about every nation on this planet, I think it is a dead cert that they will cut off access to who ever they think will compete with their homegrown industries.

[chuckufarley]

I seem to recall...

...in the distant past, that once upon a time Nvidia was the underdog. In this epoch long since past 3DFX with the go to graphics card. At least until they published an open source driver that Nvidia used to steal their patented hardware acceleration technology. Then when 3DFX sued Nvidia for patent infringment, Nvidia committed a very hostile takeover of 3DFX in order to make the case disappear.

I don't blame anyone for not trusting Nvidia. Hell, the really truly paranoid side me thinks that they set up shell companies to buy their products as soon as they launch just to drive up the prices.

[Alan Brown]

Nvidia is the risk

The first thing Nvidia did when they acquired Cumulus was to rip out support for Broadcom chipsets from it.

They have a history of predatory behaviour and it won't stop. They'll make Qualcom look polite

[Dan 55]

Re: Nvidia is the risk

Well... here it says it was the other way around, Broadcom pulled the plug on Cromulus because Nvidia was the new owner and they compete with Broadcom.

[nintendoeats]

It doesn't matter what they say...

because they will say whatever makes the deal most likely to go through. Concentrating that much power in one place is no bueno.

[JohnMurray]

Looks to me as if the UK digital secretary should be offered a seat on the Nvidia board......quietly.....

[Tom 7]

It would have to be non-executive. If not time to short Nvidia shares!

[Captain Hogwash]

Confused

How does the UK government get to stick their oar into the proposed sale of a Japanese company to an American one?

[Warm Braw]

Re: Confused

It's a UK-registered company so it's regulated by UK law, regardless of who the shareholders might be.

[Captain Hogwash]

Re: Confused

Thanks for explaining.

[Si 1]

Should never have been sold in the first place

If ARM is that important to national security then the government should be buying it. Whenever a UK company gets bought all that ever seems to happen is the IP gets retained and all the jobs go elsewhere. I know ARM is currently still based in the UK, but how long is that really going to last, under Nvidia or Softbank?

[DarkwavePunk]

Re: Should never have been sold in the first place

It would be very hard to tear ARM out of Cambridge. I briefly worked at HQ there (~3 years) and I can honestly say that I've never met a bigger bunch of Hyper-Nerds* in the 26 years I've been working in IT. Seriously mind-bending levels of Dorkage.**

* This is a compliment

** This too is a compliment

[mark l 2]

I would say its a very slim chance that China is going to allow the sale to a Nvidia anyway even if it does get passed in the UK. With the US gov current strategy of cutting off supplies of US made tech to Huawei and other China based tech companies, there is no way China is going to allow the sale of ARM to a US based company. As would just give the the US gov more ARMament to use in their trade wars.

[MrReynolds2U]

The US entity list has already led to ARM stopping export to certain countries (I believe this was due to some of the kit being co-designed in Texas).

ARM probably felt they had no option but to comply for fear of US bullying tactics against anyone who stepped out of line.

[Rich 2]

We should but it back

“We” being the UK govt. It was bloody stupid to let it be sold in the first place and it’s still bloody stupid.

I know it’s not quite the same (well not the same at all really) but I fear what happened to Inmos is likely the same as will happen to Arm. It will be asset-stripped, the tech squirrelled away, and this country will, YET AGAIN, lose/give away/let be stolen (delete as you see fit) a prime asset.

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: We should but it back

Ideology is stupid, whether it is "the state should own everything" or "the state should own nothing"

Even if it weren't transparently obvious, history shows that following such ideologies always leads to suboptimal outcomes.