Graphics acceleration hardware company S3 Inc has confirmed another of the big PC OEM wins it promised back in March (CI No 3,616). The new supporter is Compaq Computer Corp, which will use S3’s Savage4T chip in Compaq Presario consumer PCs. Compaq joins IBM Corp and Micron Electronics Inc, who have both announced systems using the chip. S3 claims it has a further big OEM deal to announce.
Compaq has previously said it would support S3’s graphics technology for mainstream and performance PCs, but did not specify a particular product line. The company has previously taken its graphics technology from ATI Technologies Inc and Nvidia Corp.
Earlier this week, S3 received an estimated $500m in stock from the Taiwanese United Microelectronics Corp which plans to merge its currently separate United Semiconductor Corp, United Integrated Circuits Corp, United Silicon Inc and Utek Semiconductor Corp operations into a single organization (CI No 3,683). S3 recently received $42m in cash from UMC for some of its patents (CI No 3,679). It currently holds 252m USC shares, and these will be swapped through a 1:1 stock exchange for 252m UMC shares, worth around $500m at the current dollar value and UMC trading price.
Under a similar arrangement, San Jose, California-based memory chip maker Alliance Semiconductor Inc gets shares in UMC worth approximately $589m in exchange for its 14.76% ownership of USC and 3.2% ownership of United Silicon. The merger is expected to be completed by the end of the calendar year.
The influx of money hasn’t stopped unconfirmed rumors that rival graphics company 3DFX Interactive Inc was considering the acquisition of S3. At the end of last year, 3DFX acquired STB Systems Inc in a $141m deal (CI No 3,559).
