14 DAY TRIAL // LSI Corporation has issued a press release to announce that it has completed the acquisition of high-performance SSD processor maker SandForce, thus finalizing a deal that was made public at the end of October 2011.
The SandForce team will join LSI as the newly formed Flash Components Division, headed by Michael Raam, formerly president and CEO of SandForce.
Raam will lead a team that is comprised of approximately 190 SandForce employees and which should help LSI reach a leadership position in the rapidly growing Ultrabook, notebook and enterprise SSD markets.
“Customer response to the announcement has been very positive and we are pleased to now be able to fully demonstrate the benefits of the combined technology capabilities of LSI and SandForce,” said Jeff Richardson, executive vice president and chief operating officer.
“Together, we offer the broadest storage technology portfolio in the industry, and are well positioned to help customers manage their growth and the explosive growth in data across enterprises and the cloud.”
According to information published by LSI when the deal was originally announced, the company paid approximately $322 million in cash, net of cash assumed, while around $48 million were invested in stock options and restricted shares held by SandForce employees.
Little is known at this point in time about LSI's plans for SandForce, but for now it seems like it SSD processors will still be used as a base for end-user solid state drives.
No details regarding new products were provided in the press release, but LSI is already selling a series of PCI Express SSDs powered by SandForce controllers that are known under the WarpDrive name.
More details about the acquisition will be provided by LSI during the company’s fourth quarter earnings conference call.