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Hottest IPO in years gives ARM a market value of nearly $60 billion.
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Yet owner Softbank sold less than 10% of the company's total shares.
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Apple, Intel and Samsung all invested, among other tech giants.
British chip designer ARM has burst out of the gates with its initial public offering (IPO) on Nasdaq, opening 10% above the $51 start price and giving the semiconductor company a market valuation of $60 billion by Thursday afternoon.
Japanese owner Softbank is only selling 9.4% of ARM’s stock in the float and retains 90% ownership. Nonetheless, the IPO is the hottest in years and has lead the best day since early August on the Dow.
Tech giants stepped in before the IPO to invest in the chip firm. Apple, Samsung and silicon rival Intel, among others, have all invested in the semicon star. ARM has its fingers in the cloud infrastructure, IoT and mobile device, among others.
Its not the first time the Cambridge-based chip company has had an IPO. It had its first IPO in April 1998. Softbank bought ARM in July 2016 and took the company private again.
Hopefully, ARM’s second chance at an IPO will be a charm. It certainly looks to be so far.
ARM is trading on Nasdaq under the stock ticker ARM (Shocker!)