Intel signed terms of the acquisition of AI chip startup SambaNova Systems, two sources with direct knowledge of the deal tell WIRED.
Date sheet details are unknown. The contract is non-binding, meaning it has not yet been finalized and can be terminated without penalties. Regulatory approval, liability review and financial due diligence can take weeks or even months.
Intel’s interest in taking over the startup came first Bloomberg reported at the end of October. At that time, the talks were in their initial stages. The report indicated that SambaNova could be sold for less than the $5 billion that the company said it had achieved in April 2021.
Notably, Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan is currently the executive chairman of SambaNova Systems. Intel Capital, which Intel is in the process of turning into a standalone fund, also invested in SambaNova Systems. Another SambaNova investor, the Japanese group SoftBank, has made serious investment at Intel earlier this year.
A SambaNova spokesman declined to comment on the matter. At the time of publication, Intel had not responded to requests for comment.
SambaNova Systems was founded in 2017 in Palo Alto, California by Kunle Olukotun, Rodrigo Liang and Christopher Ré. Olukotun and Ré are professors at Stanford University; Liang previously worked as an executive at Oracle. SambaNova Systems creates an AI chip platform for inference, the process by which huge language models make predictions based on massive amounts of data.
As of early 2025, the startup had raised $1.14 billion in funding, according to PitchBook data. In 2020, it raised $250 million from asset manager BlackRock, Intel Capital, venture firm GV and other investors, raising the startup’s valuation to $2.5 billion. The following year, SambaNova was valued at $5 billion after a massive $676 million financing round led by SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2.
Since then, the startup’s implied valuation has declined, in BlackRock’s case is reportedly lowering the value of its SambaNova shares According to The Information, by 17 percent over the last year. This likely made it a target for Intel, as well as the fact that Intel lagged behind the rest of the chip industry in creating AI chips.
After taking the top job earlier this year, Intel CEO Tan said he intended to pay down Intel’s debt, spin off the company’s non-core assets and shift to strategies focused primarily on artificial intelligence. In August, the struggling chipmaker received an $8.9 billion capital injection from the U.S. government, which it plans to utilize to expand domestic semiconductor production.