ARM Flush with Cash, Rising Stock; Could be Ripe for Acquisitions
One of the biggest benefactors of the mobile device revolution that's taking place right before our very eyes is ARM, which licenses its technology to a number of players, like NVIDIA and Qualcomm (to name just two). If you own a smartphone or tablet, there's a good chance it's rocking ARM-based hardware inside. As a result, ARM is sitting on a record amount of cash and the highest stock price in more than a decade.
Shares of ARM shot up this month to the highest they've been since 2000, as investors reacted positively when the company posted record quarterly revenue two weeks ago. In addition, ARM stated that its backlog of orders has never been higher than what it is right now.
Sitting on a mountain of cash, surrounded by happy investors, and flowing with orders, ARM may be ripe for a spending spree, Bloomberg points out.
ARM Holdings' global headquarters located in Cambridge, U.K.
"ARM is expanding its core technology into a wide range of various servers, computers, and embedded processing applications, from televisions to automotive," Rob Lineback, a senior market research analyst at IC Insights, told Bloomberg. "It wouldn't surprise me to see ARM making acquisitions in specific applications."
ARM doesn't necessarily need to make to any big splashes with multi-billion dollar game-changing acquisitions, but companies that cost tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars could make sense, and fits within ARM's budget. One such company is MIPS, which is reportedly shopping around its IP. For a company like MIPS, the attraction for ARM would be to prevent that IP from falling into the hands of a patent troll.
Alternately, ARM could simply keep doing what it's been doing, a strategy that's obviously worked well up to this point.
Shares of ARM shot up this month to the highest they've been since 2000, as investors reacted positively when the company posted record quarterly revenue two weeks ago. In addition, ARM stated that its backlog of orders has never been higher than what it is right now.
Sitting on a mountain of cash, surrounded by happy investors, and flowing with orders, ARM may be ripe for a spending spree, Bloomberg points out.
ARM Holdings' global headquarters located in Cambridge, U.K.
"ARM is expanding its core technology into a wide range of various servers, computers, and embedded processing applications, from televisions to automotive," Rob Lineback, a senior market research analyst at IC Insights, told Bloomberg. "It wouldn't surprise me to see ARM making acquisitions in specific applications."
ARM doesn't necessarily need to make to any big splashes with multi-billion dollar game-changing acquisitions, but companies that cost tens of millions or even hundreds of millions of dollars could make sense, and fits within ARM's budget. One such company is MIPS, which is reportedly shopping around its IP. For a company like MIPS, the attraction for ARM would be to prevent that IP from falling into the hands of a patent troll.
Alternately, ARM could simply keep doing what it's been doing, a strategy that's obviously worked well up to this point.
