7 ms·

Can anyone express in none emotional terms what the sale means to UK business?

edent 10y ago
The UK has seen several large / important companies being taken over in recent years. In nearly all cases it has lead to a reduction in investment, value being extracted from the business and taken overseas, lowered quality, job losses, and - in some cases - the companies collapsing. In addition, with our currency tanking, there is the speculation that our national assets are being picked up too cheaply.
- mSparks 10y ago
  ever declining. As someone who stopped his electronic engineering education in no small part because all the engineering jobs ran away to places like south korea in the 80s and 90s. Now the guarantee that the uk will join ttip since uk elites are all for it and they dont have the eu technocrats slowing them down. The only jobs left in that hell hole of a country I was born in will literally be call centers and shop floor retail. Yup. just a sad day in a long list of sad days.
  - venomsnake 10y ago
    Well you did had Toni Blair working as Louis Vutton salesman post his Prime Minister days ...
  - caoilte 10y ago
    We still do a nice line in money laundering for African dictators and selling 11tn paperweights to the Saudis if you ever want to return.
    - mSparks 10y ago
      And the worst bit of that, that is pretty much the direction (finance) I nearly went when I reassessed my options.... "Funny cause' it's true" springs to mind.
  - Lio 10y ago
    > in that hell hole of a country Look, I'm very much saddened by Brexit and by the sale of ARM but that is just pure histrionics. Even a cursory glance at the UK's export figures reveals that there is still an awful lot of science and technology research and development still going on here. There's still an aweful lot of electronics design and manufacturing going on too, you just have to look for it. You want to know what living in a hell hole is like, try asking people who've had to put they're families and all their possessions in a leaky dingy to get away from actual danger.
    - mSparks 10y ago
      No doubt. But all by a tiny group of people that do not actually employ anyone in any significant numbers. Even ARM - one of the biggest tech companies in the UK only employs about 4000 people. And yes. Hell hole. Not a complete cess pit. But by European standards (and particularly Swiss standards which is now my comparator) outside of London there is no hope, no jobs and a very depressed population that are all living day to day on credit barely able to make rent let alone feed themselves. By and large those families whove been forced to put and all their possessions in a leaky dingy to get away from the French and UK sponsored terrorists trying to overthrow Assad are all used to a much higher standard of living than the average Brit. Out of the frying pan into the fire.
      - Chlorus 10y ago
        > By and large those families whove been forced to put and all their possessions in a leaky dingy to get away from the French and UK sponsored terrorists trying to overthrow Assad are all used to a much higher standard of living than the average Brit. Out of the frying pan into the fire. Citation needed. For pretty much all of that .
        mSparks 10y ago
        Because using google is much too complicated? random sample: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/dec/07/france-funding-syrian-rebels https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/dec/07/france-funding... http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/arming-syrian-rebels/ http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/arming-syrian-rebels/ http://www.boredpanda.com/before-after-war-photos-aleppo-syria/ http://www.boredpanda.com/before-after-war-photos-aleppo-syr...
- rwmj 10y ago
  How is ARM "our national asset"? It was owned by pension funds and institutions, both at home and overseas. It's now owned by a different, but also publicly traded company, which is also owned by pension funds etc etc you get the idea. Many people work at ARM, some in Cambridge UK and some abroad. Those people - some of the smartest people I know - are still around, and even if ARM were to dramatically collapse under the new management, they would get jobs elsewhere very quickly. Perhaps they'd join start ups developing RISC-V chips, which would be a net benefit to everyone.
  - makomk 10y ago
    I think most of the value of ARM is in its IP rather than anything else. There are plenty of good chip designers around, and the best ARM cores are often the ones designed by other companies, but ARM is ubiquitous because it's well-established and there's a lot of code written for it.
  - edent 10y ago
    > How is ARM "our national asset"? It is UK based. The profits it makes, and people it employs, have a direct effect on our national and local budgets. It attracts high-class talent to the UK, further increasing its national importance. The services it creates acts as an excellent advertisement for the UK's technology industry. As you point out, many UK pensions schemes are invested in it. Personally, I'm not entirely comfortable with the phrase "national asset" - but that's the common term used. > if ARM were to dramatically collapse under the new management, they would get jobs elsewhere very quickly. Tell that to those employed by Nokia.
    - rwmj 10y ago
      None of this stuff about "national importance" moves me. If ARM was based in France then people from Cambridge UK would still be able to work there, either by moving house or remotely. For a company which is purely based on IPR and software it's completely unnecessary for the networks to be colocated. (Hardware is of course quite a bit different, but maybe that will change in future) FWIW I work, from home in the UK, for a multinational software company which is largely based in the US.
- crdb 10y ago
  > value being extracted from the business and taken overseas Anecdote: looking for a flat in Cambridge, I found a great one overlooking Market Square, last two floors above that cornish pasty store whatever it is called. We got a good deal because we agreed to take over the lease immediately from the two current occupants, who seemed in a terrible rush to leave. I asked them why, they said Index Ventures just invested double digit millions in their company and part of the terms included an immediate (literally) move to Silicon Valley. Unfortunately, I've forgotten the name of the company but the image of wealthy Americans sniping off the best British companies stuck in my head ever since.
  - 7Z7 10y ago
    Did you just put your home address on the internet?
    - zepto 10y ago
      Why is that so bad?
      - lostlogin 10y ago
        It wasn't. I looked it up on Apple maps and it took me to a US Cambridge then crashed. You're invisible to me.
piokoch 10y ago
Probably it dependes on what is going to happen with those money. If they will be reinvested in UK into something equally succesful as ARM chips, then this could be a big win for UK. UK released from EU sometimes absurdal regulations with cheaper pound can be very competitive, given the capital that is around there.
- RobAley 10y ago
  Except that we won't be released in the main from EU regulations, because unless we want to cut ~40% of our trade at a stroke we'll still need to abide by them to sell into the EU. And for most companies designing and producing two products (one meeting EU regs, one for ROW) is more cumbersome and costly.
EnderMB 10y ago
From a regional point of view could it be seen as a positive to see a tech company from outside of London thrive and be acquired?

edent 10y ago

The UK has seen several large / important companies being taken over in recent years. In nearly all cases it has lead to a reduction in investment, value being extracted from the business and taken overseas, lowered quality, job losses, and - in some cases - the companies collapsing. In addition, with our currency tanking, there is the speculation that our national assets are being picked up too cheaply.

mSparks 10y ago
ever declining. As someone who stopped his electronic engineering education in no small part because all the engineering jobs ran away to places like south korea in the 80s and 90s. Now the guarantee that the uk will join ttip since uk elites are all for it and they dont have the eu technocrats slowing them down. The only jobs left in that hell hole of a country I was born in will literally be call centers and shop floor retail. Yup. just a sad day in a long list of sad days.
- venomsnake 10y ago
  Well you did had Toni Blair working as Louis Vutton salesman post his Prime Minister days ...
- caoilte 10y ago
  We still do a nice line in money laundering for African dictators and selling 11tn paperweights to the Saudis if you ever want to return.
  - mSparks 10y ago
    And the worst bit of that, that is pretty much the direction (finance) I nearly went when I reassessed my options.... "Funny cause' it's true" springs to mind.
- Lio 10y ago
  > in that hell hole of a country Look, I'm very much saddened by Brexit and by the sale of ARM but that is just pure histrionics. Even a cursory glance at the UK's export figures reveals that there is still an awful lot of science and technology research and development still going on here. There's still an aweful lot of electronics design and manufacturing going on too, you just have to look for it. You want to know what living in a hell hole is like, try asking people who've had to put they're families and all their possessions in a leaky dingy to get away from actual danger.
  - mSparks 10y ago
    No doubt. But all by a tiny group of people that do not actually employ anyone in any significant numbers. Even ARM - one of the biggest tech companies in the UK only employs about 4000 people. And yes. Hell hole. Not a complete cess pit. But by European standards (and particularly Swiss standards which is now my comparator) outside of London there is no hope, no jobs and a very depressed population that are all living day to day on credit barely able to make rent let alone feed themselves. By and large those families whove been forced to put and all their possessions in a leaky dingy to get away from the French and UK sponsored terrorists trying to overthrow Assad are all used to a much higher standard of living than the average Brit. Out of the frying pan into the fire.
    - Chlorus 10y ago
      > By and large those families whove been forced to put and all their possessions in a leaky dingy to get away from the French and UK sponsored terrorists trying to overthrow Assad are all used to a much higher standard of living than the average Brit. Out of the frying pan into the fire. Citation needed. For pretty much all of that .
      - mSparks 10y ago
        Because using google is much too complicated? random sample: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/dec/07/france-funding-syrian-rebels https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/dec/07/france-funding... http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/arming-syrian-rebels/ http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/news/arming-syrian-rebels/ http://www.boredpanda.com/before-after-war-photos-aleppo-syria/ http://www.boredpanda.com/before-after-war-photos-aleppo-syr...
rwmj 10y ago
How is ARM "our national asset"? It was owned by pension funds and institutions, both at home and overseas. It's now owned by a different, but also publicly traded company, which is also owned by pension funds etc etc you get the idea. Many people work at ARM, some in Cambridge UK and some abroad. Those people - some of the smartest people I know - are still around, and even if ARM were to dramatically collapse under the new management, they would get jobs elsewhere very quickly. Perhaps they'd join start ups developing RISC-V chips, which would be a net benefit to everyone.
- makomk 10y ago
  I think most of the value of ARM is in its IP rather than anything else. There are plenty of good chip designers around, and the best ARM cores are often the ones designed by other companies, but ARM is ubiquitous because it's well-established and there's a lot of code written for it.
- edent 10y ago
  > How is ARM "our national asset"? It is UK based. The profits it makes, and people it employs, have a direct effect on our national and local budgets. It attracts high-class talent to the UK, further increasing its national importance. The services it creates acts as an excellent advertisement for the UK's technology industry. As you point out, many UK pensions schemes are invested in it. Personally, I'm not entirely comfortable with the phrase "national asset" - but that's the common term used. > if ARM were to dramatically collapse under the new management, they would get jobs elsewhere very quickly. Tell that to those employed by Nokia.
  - rwmj 10y ago
    None of this stuff about "national importance" moves me. If ARM was based in France then people from Cambridge UK would still be able to work there, either by moving house or remotely. For a company which is purely based on IPR and software it's completely unnecessary for the networks to be colocated. (Hardware is of course quite a bit different, but maybe that will change in future) FWIW I work, from home in the UK, for a multinational software company which is largely based in the US.
crdb 10y ago
> value being extracted from the business and taken overseas Anecdote: looking for a flat in Cambridge, I found a great one overlooking Market Square, last two floors above that cornish pasty store whatever it is called. We got a good deal because we agreed to take over the lease immediately from the two current occupants, who seemed in a terrible rush to leave. I asked them why, they said Index Ventures just invested double digit millions in their company and part of the terms included an immediate (literally) move to Silicon Valley. Unfortunately, I've forgotten the name of the company but the image of wealthy Americans sniping off the best British companies stuck in my head ever since.
- 7Z7 10y ago
  Did you just put your home address on the internet?
  - zepto 10y ago
    Why is that so bad?
    - lostlogin 10y ago
      It wasn't. I looked it up on Apple maps and it took me to a US Cambridge then crashed. You're invisible to me.

piokoch 10y ago

Probably it dependes on what is going to happen with those money. If they will be reinvested in UK into something equally succesful as ARM chips, then this could be a big win for UK. UK released from EU sometimes absurdal regulations with cheaper pound can be very competitive, given the capital that is around there.

RobAley 10y ago
Except that we won't be released in the main from EU regulations, because unless we want to cut ~40% of our trade at a stroke we'll still need to abide by them to sell into the EU. And for most companies designing and producing two products (one meeting EU regs, one for ROW) is more cumbersome and costly.

EnderMB 10y ago

From a regional point of view could it be seen as a positive to see a tech company from outside of London thrive and be acquired?