Marvell acquires Cavium for apparent data centre push

Chip giant Marvell has confirmed the finalisation of a deal to acquire rival Cavium for £4.53 billion, in an apparent move to push its parts deeper into the data centre.

Founded in 2001, San Jose-based Cavium was an early pioneer in many-core Arm processors aimed at the data centre market. While its initial attempts to challenge the dominance of Intel's x86 architecture in this sector were rebuffed, large companies from Google to Facebook have taken renewed interest in the promise of more cores in a lower power envelope and begun investment in Arm-based server systems - and now Marvell has picked up Cavium to help it be part of that sea-change in the market.

'This is an exciting combination of two very complementary companies that together equal more than the sum of their parts,' claims Marvell president and chief executive Matt Murphy of the deal. 'This combination expands and diversifies our revenue base and end markets, and enables us to deliver a broader set of differentiated solutions to our customers. Syed Ali has built an outstanding company, and I'm excited that he is joining the [Marvell] Board. I'm equally excited that Cavium's Co-founder Raghib Hussain and vice president of IC [Integrated Circuit] engineering Anil Jain will also join my senior leadership team. Together, we all will be able to deliver immediate and long-term value to our customers, employees and shareholders.'

'Individually, our businesses are exceptionally strong, but together, we will be one of the few companies in the world capable of delivering such a comprehensive set of end-to-end solutions to our combined customer base,' adds Cavium co-founder and chief executive Syed Ali. 'Our potential is huge. We look forward to working closely with the Marvell team to ensure a smooth transition and to start unlocking the significant opportunities that our combination creates.'

The deal, one of the biggest in recent history, will see an overall transaction value of £4.53 billion split between cash and shares, funded through Marvell's cash-on-hand and debt financing. The deal is expected to close some time next year, subject to regulatory approval.