Seagate to Buy Samsung Disk Drive Unit
Seagate Technology, the hard disk drive maker, said on Tuesday that it would enter a strategic partnership with Samsung Electronics, purchasing the South Korean company’s hard disk drive unit for $1.375 billion in cash and shares.
The deal is another major consolidation in the sector, after Western Digital’s announcement last month that it would buy Hitachi Global Storage Technologies for $4.3 billion.
That acquisition gave Western Digital almost half the market in hard disk drives, double Seagate’s share, according to iSuppli.
Now Seagate is trying to catch up, by adding Samsung’s 10 percent share of the market to the nearly 30 percent it already holds.
Under the terms of the deal, Seagate and Samsung will deepen their cross-licensing and research and development collaboration, and Samsung will place an executive on Seagate’s board.
Samsung will supply Seagate with its semiconductor products, and Seagate will in turn supply Samsung with hard disk drives for the personal computers, notebooks and other devices made by the South Korean company.
“The transactions and agreements significantly expand Seagate’s customer access in China and Southeast Asia,” the companies said in a joint statement.Seagate will give Samsung $687.5 million worth of its own shares, amounting to a 9.6 percent stake in the company, and pay the rest in cash.
The deal is expected to close by the end of the year, pending regulatory approval, and Seagate predicts it will be accretive to cash flow within a year.
Seagate hired Morgan Stanley as financial adviser and Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati as legal counsel, while Samsung hired Allen & Company as its adviser and the law firm Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker.
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