Nokia to acquire Infinera for $2.3B
Nokia will acquire the optical networking and chip company Infinera for $ 2.3 billion.
Nokia and Infinera see a significant opportunity in merging to improve scale and profitability. The transaction also aligns strongly with Nokia’s strategy to strengthen the company’s technology leadership in optical and increase exposure to webscale customers, the fastest growing segment of the market.
The combined business will have significant in-house capabilities, including an expanded digital signal processor (DSP) development team, expertise across silicon photonics and InP-based semiconductor material sciences, and deeper competency in photonic integrated circuit (PIC) technology.
Pekka Lundmark, president and CEO of Nokia, said: “In 2021 we increased our organic investment in optical networks with a view to improving our competitiveness. That decision has paid off and has delivered improved customer recognition, strong sales growth and increased profitability. We believe now is the right time to take a compelling inorganic step to further expand Nokia’s scale in optical networks. The combined businesses have a strong strategic fit given their highly complementary customer, geographic and technology profiles. With the opportunity to deliver over 10 percent comparable EPS accretion, we believe this will create significant value for shareholders.”
David Heard, CEO of Infinera, said: “We are really excited about the value this combination will bring to our global customers. We believe Nokia is an excellent partner and together we will have greater scale and deeper resources to set the pace of innovation and address rapidly changing customer needs at a time when optics are more important than ever – across telecom networks, inter-data center applications, and now inside the data center. This combination will further leverage our vertically integrated optical semiconductor technologies. Furthermore, our stakeholders will have the opportunity to participate in the upside of a global leader in optical networking solutions.”
