Intel snaps up Wind River for $884 million

Business figures shaking hands

Intel is shelling out $884 million to snap up embedded device software vendor Wind River as it tries to diversify its business outside its mainstay of PCs and servers.

Subject to regulatory approval, the deal is expected to close this summer. Once that's happened, Wind River will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Intel, with employees reporting to the chip giant's Software and Services Group, which is headed up by vice president and general manager Renee James.

"This acquisition will bring us complementary, market-leading software assets and an incredibly talented group of people to help us continue to grow our embedded systems and mobile device capabilities," said James, in a statement.

"Wind River has thousands of customers in a wide range of markets, and now both companies will be better positioned to meet growth opportunities in these areas."

Ken Klein, Wind River's chairman, president and chief executive, added in a statement: "As a wholly owned subsidiary, Wind River will more tightly align its software expertise to Intel's platforms to speed the pace of progress and software innovation. We remain committed to continuing to provide leading solutions across multiple hardware architectures and delivering the same world-class support to which our customers have grown accustomed."

In separate news, earlier this week, Intel also settled a legal battle with Psion over the term netbook'.

Maggie Holland

Maggie has been a journalist since 1999, starting her career as an editorial assistant on then-weekly magazine Computing, before working her way up to senior reporter level. In 2006, just weeks before ITPro was launched, Maggie joined Dennis Publishing as a reporter. Having worked her way up to editor of ITPro, she was appointed group editor of CloudPro and ITPro in April 2012. She became the editorial director and took responsibility for ChannelPro, in 2016.

Her areas of particular interest, aside from cloud, include management and C-level issues, the business value of technology, green and environmental issues and careers to name but a few.