Intel Corp has resumed talks to purchase programmable-chip maker Altera Corp and is close to a $16 billion deal, people familiar with the matter said on Friday, paving way for the third mega semiconductor-chip deal this year.The price for Altera could be as much as $54 per share, according to one of the people. This would be a 15 percent premium over the stock's Thursday close of $46.97.If the deal were to go through, it would be Intel's largest, topping its $7.7 billion purchase of security software maker McAfee in 2011. It would also underscore Intel Chief Executive Officer Brian Krzanich's determination to expand into new markets as the personal computer industry - the company's mainstay - loses steam.
Altera Corporation is a semiconductor company. The Company designs and sells high-performance, high-density programmable logic devices (PLDs), HardCopy application-specific integrated circuit (ASIC) devices, power system-on-chip devices (PowerSoCs), pre-defined design building blocks known as intellectual property (IP) cores, and associated development tools. Shares of ALTR traded higher by 4.3% or $2.02/share to $48.99. In the past year, the shares have traded as low as $30.47 and as high as $50.10. On average, 6265780 shares of ALTR exchange hands on a given day and today's volume is recorded at 16109944.
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