The acquisition of Dialog’s low-power technologies and connectivity expertise centered around its mixed-signal integrated circuits (ICs) adds complementary product lines, strengthening Renesas’ global footprint across large, high-growth markets in consumer, industrial and automotive applications.
As with all the combinations of companies in this field, the acquisition of Dialog is expected to create redundancies - which the financial executives describe as "cost savings from operational efficiencies" of approximately 125 million USD. Dialog is headquartered in the United Kingdom but owns design and manufacturing facilities in Ireland, Germany, Taiwan and China, among other countries.
Dialog is an innovative provider of highly-integrated and power-efficient mixed-signal ICs for a broad array of companies in the consumer electronics, mobile devices, automotive and industrial end-markets. Centered around its low-power and mixed-signal expertise, Dialog is recognized in the battery, power management, power conversion, and wireless charging domains, as well as offering a broad range of Bluetooth, WiFi and audio system-on-chips (SoCs) for smartphones, smart home solutions and wearables.
Specifically in the audio domain, Dialog offers a range of low power, hi-fi audio codecs and Class D amplifiers with different features and packages suitable for digital portable audio products. On wireless audio, Dialog offers a complete range of short range wireless ICs for devices ranging from DECT phones and wireless headsets to game controllers providing improved battery life. On USB Audio, Dialog offers platform solutions for UC&C USB headsets and headphones.
The company launched its latest DA740x family of highly-integrated audio codec chips for active noise cancellation (ANC) earbuds and headphones in 2019. The DA740x family supports feedforward and feedback ANC topologies, in which the noise cancelling microphones are located either outside or inside the headphone cup. With its integrated custom filtering, the DA740x also enables a fully hybrid implementation which combines the best of both worlds by providing high performance ANC while maximizing audio quality and battery life. The chip family is agnostic to the type of audio interface meaning it is effective in both wired and wireless applications. Apple, Samsung and Huawei are among the companies using these solutions.
All these systems complement and expand Renesas’ portfolio in delivering comprehensive solutions to improve performance and efficiency in high-computing electronic systems. Renesas also acquired Intersil in 2016 for $3.2 billion USD, and Integrated Device Technology (IDT), Inc. in 2019 for $6.7 billion USD, making the Japanese into a leading player in embedded solutions. Renesas currently offers a complete range of high-end 32-bit and 64-bit Arm-based microprocessors serving cutting-edge applications in human machine interfaces (HMI), embedded vision, embedded artificial intelligence (e-AI), and real-time control and industrial Ethernet connectivity.
"The transaction we announced today represents our next important step in catapulting Renesas’ growth plan to achieve substantial strategic and financial benefits, following our previous acquisitions," says Hidetoshi Shibata, President and CEO of Renesas. "Dialog has a strong culture of innovation along with excellent customer relationships and serves fast growing areas including IoT, industrial and automotive. By bringing Dialog’s talented team and expertise into Renesas, together, we will accelerate innovation for customers and create sustainable value for our shareholders."
"For several years, we have successfully executed on a diversification strategy that positions Dialog for high-growth," says Dr. Jalal Bagherli, CEO of Dialog. "We have built a strong foundation of high-performance analog and power efficient mixed-signal expertise, extended our product portfolio and applied our technologies into markets including 5G, wearables, automotive, smart home, connected medical and industrial IoT. This compelling platform – combined with Renesas’ leading embedded compute, analog and power portfolio – creates even greater growth opportunities in today’s increasingly connected world. The Dialog team is excited to join forces with Renesas. The combined company will be in an even stronger position to provide innovative products for these markets, building on Renesas’ extensive sales, distribution and customer support capabilities."
Reneses believes the combined entities scales its capabilities in low-power technologies for connected devices, and adds differentiation to Renesas solutions by adding low-power Wi-Fi and Bluetooth SoCs, while reinforcing the company's engineering and design scale and more effective go-to-market initiatives.
"Dialog has a differentiated portfolio of low-power mixed-signal products, decades of experience in developing custom and configurable solutions for the world’s largest customers and expertise in low-power connectivity that are highly complementary to Renesas. The acquisition of these low-power technologies enhances Renesas’ product portfolio and expands horizons in addressing high-growth markets in the IoT field," Renesas states.
The transaction has been unanimously approved by the boards of directors of both companies and is expected to close by the end of calendar year 2021, subject to approval by Dialog shareholders as well as regulatory approvals.
www.renesas.com
www.dialog-semiconductor.com
