Qualcomm has approached its competitor Intel about its readiness to sell the business. Although no formal offer has been made, discussions are ongoing, according to The New York Times. Earlier it was reported that Qualcomm is considering buying only a part of Intel’s business, not the entire company.

Intel’s market value is currently about $93 billion, despite the fact that its shares have fallen by almost 40% over the past year, and after the announcement of the results of the last fiscal quarter, the shares fell by 30% in one day. Meanwhile, Qualcomm’s market capitalization, which has grown by 55%, is $169 billion. Given these figures, any acquisition would be expensive and complicated.

The possibility of Qualcomm acquiring Intel would have seemed unthinkable a decade ago. However, Intel’s recent problems, including missed opportunities in mobile chip sales and lagging behind NVIDIA in the artificial intelligence market, have weakened what was once one of Silicon Valley’s largest companies. Intel’s once industry-leading manufacturing technology has also fallen behind Taiwan’s TSMC.

In early August, Intel announced a quarterly loss of $1.6 billion and plans to cut 15,000 jobs. The company has also recently suspended plans to build new factories in Germany and Poland, despite being the largest planned recipient of federal funding under the CHIPS Act and having just recently received additional funding of $3 billion.

Qualcomm, headquartered in San Diego, is a leader in mobile technology and supplies chips for flagship smartphones to major players such as Samsung. Unlike Intel, Qualcomm operates as a “fabless” chip developer, meaning it does not own or operate its own fabs. This makes it unlikely that Qualcomm would be interested in acquiring Intel’s manufacturing assets, which are expensive to maintain. Instead, it may be more focused on Intel’s chip design capabilities and sales expertise.

Former Qualcomm executive Patrick Little, who is now CEO of SiFive, a Silicon Valley startup specializing in microprocessor design, noted that the acquisition of Intel’s design operations could significantly accelerate Qualcomm’s growth in areas where it might otherwise need to develop expertise over time.

Any potential transaction would be subject to rigorous antitrust and national security review, given Intel’s importance to defense applications and the entire U.S. semiconductor industry. Both companies declined to comment on the matter, and it remains uncertain whether a deal proposal will go through.