Intel’s tempting discount is less-than-solid state

Reuters

Intel’s tempting discount is less-than-solid state

Sep 23, 2024 at 4:24 pm GMT

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The author is a Reuters Breakingviews columnist. The opinions expressed are his own.

By Robert Cyran

NEW YORK, Sept 23 (Reuters Breakingviews) -Intel’s INTC.O meltdown has opportunistic onlookers salivating. The once-leading U.S. chipmaker’s shares are down by half this year. Now, rival Qualcomm QCOM.O is mulling a bid for the whole firm, according to Reuters. Buyout shop Apollo Global Management APO.N, meanwhile, is offering to invest up to $5 billion according to Bloomberg. Thing is, this isn’t the screaming deal it might seem.

Intel does have valuable pieces. Specialized chip unit Altera, on a 20% discount to faster-growing Lattice Semiconductor’s LSCC.O multiple of 9.5 times revenue, might be worth $15 billion. A stake in self-driving auto firm Mobileye Global MBLY.O is worth around $8 billion.

Intel’s crown jewel of designing chips for PCs and data centers, meanwhile, is expected to generate nearly $50 billion of revenue over the next four quarters, according to LSEG data. On rival AMD’s AMD.O roughly 8 times sales multiple, that would be worth $390 billion. Even with some $20 billion of net debt, that’s over three times Intel’s current valuation.

But this ignores the elephant in the clean room. Intel is losing share to AMD and PC newcomers like Qualcomm. Its revenue is essentially flat from a decade ago; AMD’s has quadrupled. Put simply, the business deserves a substantially lower valuation.

Moreover, unlike Qualcomm or AMD, Intel is also a manufacturer. Those operations are a money pit, generating $4.2 billion of revenue last quarter but losing $2.8 billion. Intel’s head-to-head competition against the much-larger Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing 2330.TW ensures it must shovel ever-more money into the business. That makes valuing it near-impossible: sure, TSMC’s market capitalization stands at nearly $800 billion, but it sported a 37% net income margin last quarter.

Worse, the U.S. government has made these operations a cornerstone of its chip strategy, awarding Intel billions in subsidies. Regulators will carefully guard these operations, before even considering the antitrust problem posed by Intel and Qualcomm’s combined might.

Other watchdogs matter, too. Intel does business in China, where enforcers have killed deals by both the company led by Pat Gelsinger and its potential suitor. Antitrust pushback effectively snuffed out Qualcomm's bid for NXP Semiconductors NXPI.O in 2018, and Intel's acquisition of Tower Semiconductor TSEM.TA last year.

Of course, Intel could definitely use cash. Apollo could capitalize, as it did when it invested in a $900 million slug of preferred equity issued by Western Digital WDC.O, or $1.25 billion of secured notes from chipmaker Wolfspeed WOLF.N. Both promised roughly 10% yields at minimum. Whether Intel can bear those costs is a matter for negotiation; adding equity in to juice returns might not offer the upside a naive sum-of-the-parts implies. Intel is cheap - but deservedly so.

Follow @rob_cyran on X

CONTEXT NEWS

Chipmaker Qualcomm has approached rival Intel about a takeover, Reuters reported on Sept. 20 citing an unnamed source. This follows an earlier Reuters report that Qualcomm was examining acquiring pieces of Intel, and in particular its PC business. Talks are at an early stage, and no formal offer has been made.

Separately, buyout firm Apollo Global Management has offered to make an equity-like investment of up to $5 billion in Intel, according to a Bloomberg story on Sept. 22. In June, Apollo agreed to pay $11 billion for 49% ownership in a joint venture that has the right to make semiconductors at Intel’s new manufacturing plant in Ireland.

Qualcomm shares have outperformed Intel's https://reut.rs/3TGHT3P

Editing by Jonathan Guilford and Pranav Kiran

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