TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — Chinese mobile chip designer Unisoc is looking for new investors to take over a controlling stake in the company from the embattled Tsinghua Unigroup.
Unisoc is seeking buyers prepared to pay 20 billion yuan (US$3.1 billion) to replace Tsinghua’s 35.2% stake, three sources told Nikkei. State-backed Tsinghua Unigroup is staring at bankruptcy after missing a series of bond payments since last November and is under pressure to sell.
The chip design firm is talking to possible investors in order to convince it is financially sound, the sources said. However, some of these potential investors are hesitant due to the high asking price, which would give Unisoc a 55 billion yuan valuation, the report said.
Nikkei said existing shareholders and prospective buyers estimate the value of Unisoc to be around 30 billion yuan. Unisoc has said it will begin preparing for an initial public offering, after having delayed several previous attempts to go public since 2018.
After news broke on July 9 that Tsinghua Unigroup was facing restructuring under bankruptcy for failing to repay debts, Unisoc stressed on WeChat that it was under different management, did not share business relations with Tsinghua Unigroup, and that the parent company was not involved in the chip designer’s daily operations, according to Nikkei.
In addition to Unisoc, other Tsinghua subsidiaries and affiliates are also looking to reduce their exposure to Tsinghua Unigroup, including Yangtze Memory Technologies, Unigroup Guoxin Microelectronics, and Unisplendour, per Nikkei. The three companies are all open to a sale that would give them more independence from Tsinghua, the sources told the outlet.
