Micron acquires Inotera Memories for 2.9 billion euros

Memory manufacturer Micron Technology Inc. has paid 3.2 billion dollars, converted 2.9 billion euros, for Inotera Memories Inc. Micron already owned a third of Inotera and will become the sole owner of the manufacturer with the acquisition.

With the acquisition, the entire dram production of Inotera will be in the hands of Micron, strengthening its position in the dram market. Micron hopes that Inotera will be fully transitioned to its 20nm technology by mid-2016.

Inotera currently has two dram factories for 300mm wafers, accounting for nearly ten percent of global production. Micron already took the entire production off in practice, Inotera supplied the company with 35 percent of its total dram capacity.

The American Micron already owns about 33 percent of the shares in the Taiwan-based Inotera Memories and is buying the rest of the shares with the converted 2.9 billion euros. Inotera is a joint venture, founded in 2008 by Nanya and Infineon, later Qimonda. Micron then bought back by acquiring the shares of Qimonda. With this acquisition, Micron was already entitled to half the production capacity of Inotera Memories, but in practice the company already purchased the entire production from the manufacturer.

Concurrent with the acquisition, Micron and Nanya are announcing a new agreement related to dram production on 1xnm. This deal allows Nanya to leverage Micron’s current and upcoming dram technology. The two companies already have agreements on technology for 20nm production, which are not affected by the new agreement.