SK Hynix completes first phase of Intel’s NAND business acquisition

SK Hynix announced Thursday that it has completed the first phase of acquiring Intel’s NAND flash business.

Having won the approval from the Chinese competition authorities last Wednesday, the South Korean chipmaker took the first step of acquiring Intel’s major assets. The assets include the NAND solid-state drive (SSD) business and the Dalian Fab factory, and for those assets, SK Hynix is paying 7 billion dollars to Intel out of the 9-billion-dollar acquisition payment.

The first closing is expected to occur around March 2025 when SK Hynix will pay the remaining 2 billion dollars for the remaining assets in both physical and non-physical forms as well as the Dalian fab workforces, which will seal the final deal.

SK Hynix said it has given its Intel’s SSD operator a new name “Solidigm.” A combined word of “solid state” and “paradigm,” Solidigm reflects the company’s commitment to driving a paradigm shift in the memory solution industry. Lee Seok-hee, the president and CEO of SK Hynix, will spearhead the process of integration after temporarily doubling as a chair, and Rob Crooke, the vice president of Intel, will be appointed as CEO.


Do-Young Kwak now@donga.com