South Korean company SK Hynix, producer of DRAM and NAND, announced 20 on October that will take over the NAND memory chip division from Intel. The transaction, which will amount to a trifle of USD 9 billion (approx. PLN 35 billion), will cover business related to SSD carriers, NAND memories, wafer production and a factory in the city of Dalian, China. However, Intel will have the XPoint (Intel Optane) 3D memory chips division, largely produced by Micron. Acquisition of NAND flash manufacturing facilities, which brought Intel revenues of $ 2.8 billion in the first quarter 2020 of the year, will make SK Hynix the second largest shareholder in the NAND memory market , giving way only to the dominant Samsung. We got to know the details of the signed contract and the date of its finalization.

SK Hynix will take over the NAND memory division from Intel for a trifle of 9 billion dollars (35 billion zlotys ). The first phase of the transaction is to be completed before the end 2021 of the year, while its finalization will take place by mid-March 2025 of the year. We got to know the details of the contract.

It is anticipated that any approvals from government regulators will be obtained in the second half of the year 2021 (until November 1), while all assets covered by the contract signed by SK Hynix and Intel will be transferred to 2025 year. In the first phase, SK Hynix will pay $ 7 billion for the SSD division, including intellectual property, employees, and the Dalian plant. Remaining assets, including intellectual property closely related to NAND flash wafer manufacturing and design, research and development (R&D) specialists and employees of the said factory in China, will be transferred to SK Hynix to 15 March 2025 of the year when the contract will be finalized. Then also the remaining amount of $ 2 billion will be paid. Pending finalization, Intel will still be able to manufacture NAND memory at its Dalian plant and will retain all intellectual property rights that will not be redirected until the second phase of the transaction.

According to the statistics of the analytical company Trendfocus, SK Hynix’s shares in the second quarter 2020 of the year on the SSD market, they were less than 13 percent, while Intel was 6.2% (in terms of the number of copies sold). Thanks to this transaction, SK Hynix will be able to increase its share in the NAND memory market and thus significantly strengthen its position, ahead of or approaching respectively Western Digital Corporation (WDC) and Samsung, which are SK Hyni’s biggest competitors