GlobalFoundries (GF), a wafer foundry, announced earlier on July 7, US West Coast time.Announce, will acquire processor technology asset manufacturersMIPS, thereby strengthening its RISC-V architecture processor core, software tools and other technical capabilities, and expanding its competitive advantages in markets such as AI, self-driving, industrial automation, data centers and edge intelligence.
The transaction is expected to be completed in the second half of 2025 and is subject to approval by relevant regulatory authorities. After the acquisition, MIPS will continue to operate as an independent unit of GlobalFoundries.
GlobalFoundries stated that this acquisition will further combine its own process advantages with MIPS's scalable processor technology assets to provide more flexible customized solutions, helping customers create high-performance, low-power, and future-proof chip products. Niels Anderskouv, GlobalFoundries' Chief Operating Officer, further stated, "MIPS's computing technology assets, focused on developing high-performance, critical applications, perfectly meet the market demand for increasingly diverse AI platforms. This acquisition will expand our RISC-V-based open platform offerings for applications such as autonomous vehicles, industrial applications, and data centers."
In recent years, MIPS has continued to promote processor technology based on the open architecture RISC-V and launched the Atlas series product portfolio, covering real-time processing, application processors and AI edge computing cores. Through the Atlas Explorer virtual platform, it helps chip design teams optimize processor performance, power consumption and area in the early stages, thereby enhancing overall development efficiency.
MIPS CEO Sameer Wasson stated that joining GlobalFoundries will allow the company to leverage GlobalFoundries' global manufacturing, security, and long-term supply capabilities to accelerate the development of "Physical AI" applications in areas such as self-driving cars and industrial robotics, ushering in a new chapter in the company's development. MIPS will continue to operate as an independent business unit, serving customers in the global self-driving, industrial control, and embedded systems markets.
GlobalFoundries has been actively expanding into the AI chip foundry market in recent years. In addition to strengthening its FinFET and FD-SOI process technologies, it has also focused on open architecture platforms, physical technology assets, and chip security. The acquisition of MIPS not only expands GlobalFoundries' processor technology portfolio but also enhances its ability to provide customers with complete "design-to-manufacturing" solutions.
MIPS has previously experienced multiple resale experiences and has also transitioned from its original Arm architecture to RISC-V architecture.
MIPS was founded in 1981 by John Hennessy, president of Stanford University and current chairman of Alphabet. It also leveraged a reduced instruction set (RISE) design and even became a direct competitor to Arm. However, while the Arm architecture continued to expand, MIPS's less open licensing model resulted in numerous application restrictions. As a result, it gradually lost its market advantage and was acquired by Imagination Technologies in November 2012.
However, as Imagination Technologies subsequently failed in the market, it resold MIPS to Wave Computing. Although it made the MIPS architecture open source in the hope of attracting more market use, the market has almost shifted to the Arm architecture design and development model, which has made the MIPS architecture lose development space. Therefore, it subsequently turned to the RISC-V camp, which is also designed with an open source architecture, and created subsequent processor products based on the RISC-V architecture, with security and high performance as the core of the product, targeting application scenarios such as self-driving, industrial control, and edge AI.
As AI technology continues to extend to edge and physical devices, the RISC-V architecture is rapidly gaining popularity due to its open and modular nature. GlobalFoundries' acquisition of MIPS is expected to further promote the application of the RISC-V architecture in high-performance and low-power computing, accelerating the evolution of the global AI ecosystem. By combining the strengths of both parties in manufacturing, design, and ecosystem integration, GlobalFoundries will provide more efficient, flexible, and secure AI solutions for the automotive, industrial, data center, and edge computing markets, strengthening its competitiveness in the next-generation intelligent computing landscape.
