ARM Faces a Boardroom Revolt as It Seeks to Remove the CEO of Its Chinese Joint Venture
ARM, the British silicon ship designer backed by SoftBank, is currently embroiled in a nail-biting boardroom conflict, equipped with an equally appropriate dramatic flareup.
To wit, ARM issued a statement on Wednesday, disclosing that the board of its Chinese joint venture – ARM China – has approved the removal of the incumbent chairman and CEO, Allen Wu. Bear in mind that the British chip designer was purchased by the Japanese behemoth, SoftBank, in 2016 for £24.3 billion. ARM currently holds a 49 percent stake in its Chinese JV, with a consortium of investors led by the Chinese equity fund, Hopu Investment, retaining the residual 51 percent stake.
However, just hours after the initial statement by ARM, its Chinese JV issued a contradictory statement on Weibo, reiterating that Allen Wu "continues to serve as its CEO" and that ARM China was operating as usual.
See also: SoftBank's Arm Says China CEO Fired for Major Irregularities
"Following a whistleblower complaint and several other current and former employee complaints, an investigation was undertaken by Arm Limited," the company said in its latest statement, jointly issued with shareholder Hopu Investment. "Evidence received from multiple sources found serious irregularities, including failing to disclose conflicts of interest and violations of the employee handbook." Wu didn't respond to emails and a message sent via his LinkedIn profile seeking comment.
SoftBank's China Chip Venture Rejects Accusations Against CEO
Also at EE Times and TechNode.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Friday June 12 2020, @03:35PM
They did another one three years ago when they lost the lawsuit against Apple and had to raise a billion in cash quickly to pay. There was a big Qualcomm contingent at the LLVM DevMeeting at the time - about half of them had jobs at the end. They killed off their ARM server processor effort then, along with a bunch of other related bits. It probably set ARM back several years in the server space - no one else had competitive cores for that market segment on anywhere near the same timelines.
sudo mod me up