The rumors proved to be true: Qualcomm, the leader in cellphone chips, is buying NXP, maker of NFC chips. Price: $47 billion, an 11 percent premium over yesterday’s close.
Although NXP is best known in the wearables and smartphone worlds as the leader in NFC technology, the rest of the world knows it as the biggest maker of processors in the car industry through its recent purchase of Freescale. For Qualcomm, therefore, this deal is a two-fer: expanding its portfolio both inside its core markets and diversifying at the same time.