14b

CES, Hardware

British Government Contributes $44 Million Towards Europe’s $1.4 Billion Investment in Semiconductor Industry

The UK has exited the European Union, but semiconductor development is emerging as one of the areas where it hopes to partner for better economies of scale — and much-needed funding. The UK itself said it would put up a more modest £35 million ($44 million) in funding for UK efforts over the next few years as part of that. The Chips Joint Undertaking, for example, has an overall budget of about €11 billion from both public and private contributions. In December 2023, Pragmatic Semiconductor, another Cambridge-based chip company, raised $231 million at a $500 million valuation. “We are very happy to welcome the UK to the Chips Joint Undertaking as a participating state,” said Jari Kinaret, Chips JU Executive Director, in a statement.

Dylan Williams
March 13, 2024

Robotics & AI

Did HPE’s Acquisition of Juniper for $14B Prove to be a Shrewd Decision?

When HPE announced its intention to acquire Juniper Networks for $14 billion in cold, hard cash earlier this month, it was a bit of a shock. In fact, in a blog post announcing the deal, Juniper CEO Rami Rahim suggested it was more about AI. “This combination with HPE is expected to enable us to deliver more comprehensive, more competitive, truly end-to-end experience-first AI-native solutions,” he wrote. Assuming regulators don’t object — not exactly a given these days — this deal could close later this year or early next. Since the deal was announced on January 12, HPE investors seem lukewarm about it; that is, if the stock price is any indication of their sentiment.