The first phase of its acquisition of Intel Corp’s NAND flash memory chip business has been completed by SK Hynix Inc, the South Korean company said.

The company has already obtained regulatory approval for the deal from regulators in eight countries including from China.

According to the deal, against the first phase of the acquisition, the second largest memory chip maker of the world will pay $7 billion out of the total $9 billion price tag of the deal, the company said in a statement announcing the completion of the first phase of the acquisition. 

The two companies had inked the acquisition deal in 2020. Following the acquisition, the United States based chip maker will be able to concentrate on its smaller but more lucrative Optane memory business.

The deal marks its largest ever acquisition for South Korea’s SK Hynix, and will help the company in its strategy to enhance its capacity to build NAND chips, which are in high demand from clients and used for storing data in smartphones and data center servers.

“This acquisition will present a paradigm shifting moment for SK Hynix’s NAND flash business to enter the global top tier level,” said Park Jung-ho, vice chairman and co-CEO of SK Hynix.

The newly acquired NAND solid-state drive (SSD) business will be managed by a San Jose, California, United States-based SK Hynix subsidiary called Solidigm.

The executive chairman of Solidigm will be SK Hynix co-CEO Lee Seok-hee, SK Hynix said in the statement, while the position of CEO of Solidigm will be adorned by Rob Crooke, former senior vice president of Intel.

The two companies expect to complete the second phase of the deal in or after March 2025 which will also coincide with the payment of the remaining $2 billion of the deal. The second phase will comprise of the acquisition of Intel’s remaining assets in the NAND business including intellectual property and workforce by SK Hynix, the statement from the company said.

(Adapted from NDTV.com)