By Dhirendra Tripathi
Investing.com – Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) rose 4.5% in Monday’s trading on growing support from Arm customers to buy the U.K.-based chip designer.
Nvidia had signed a deal with Softbank (OTC:SFTBY) last September to acquire its stake in Arm and set an 18-month deadline to complete the $40 billion transaction.
Broadcom (NASDAQ:AVGO), MediaTek (TW:2454) and Marvell Technology (NASDAQ:MRVL) are Arm’s first customers to publicly support the takeover, The Sunday Times reported.
Nvidia is awaiting approval from regulators in the U.S., the U.K., the European Union and China for the proposed acquisition.
According to reports, rival Qualcomm (NASDAQ:QCOM) and tech giants including Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) have voiced fears that Nvidia could limit the supply of the company’s technology to its competitors or raise prices. Arm offers its designs to more than 500 companies that make their own chips.
A Financial Times report earlier this month said the process may take longer given that Nvidia had requested for approval from the Chinese authorities only recently and that itself could take 18 months.
Arm has as a joint venture, headquartered in Shanghai, with Chinese private equity firm Hopu Investments. Nvidia will need the approval of the authorities there to acquire a stake in Arm China.