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Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.<\/span><\/p>\n Toyota\u2019s biggest supplier, Denso, has proposed a takeover of Rohm that would value the automotive chipmaker at \u00a51.3tn ($8.2bn) as it attempts to develop high-end semiconductors that are vital for electric vehicles and autonomous driving to compete with China.<\/p>\n Denso\u2019s bid is at an 18 per cent premium to the current share price of the Kyoto-based maker of power semiconductors, according to people familiar with the deal terms.<\/p>\n Shares of Denso fell as much as 5.6 per cent on Friday on the news, which was first reported by Nikkei, while trading of Rohm\u2019s shares was halted due to a glut of buy orders.<\/p>\n The move is the first major step to realising the Japanese government\u2019s long-held ambition to consolidate the country\u2019s power semiconductor sector, which has been under siege from Chinese rivals and left with excess capacity.<\/p>\n Power semiconductors, which manage high voltages and currents, are essential for EVs and self-driving cars as they help\u00a0to minimise energy loss. Cutting-edge logic chips\u00a0that Denso is\u00a0also developing can serve as the \u201cbrain\u201d of the vehicle for autonomous driving functions.<\/p>\n Denso has been particularly concerned about the rise of a handful of Chinese suppliers, such as YMTC, in the race to develop next-generation silicon carbide chips for EVs and systems on a chip (SoC) used for computing and control in autonomous driving.<\/p>\n Carmakers have become increasingly worried about the ability to secure chip supplies after shortages caused by the coronavirus pandemic and the Dutch government takeover of Nexperia led to severe production outages.<\/p>\n Denso confirmed it was considering strategic options with Rohm, including buying all of its shares, but no decisions had been made. Rohm did not respond to a request for comment.<\/p>\n The two companies have had a partnership since May 2025, leading Denso to take a small minority stake in the group.<\/p>\n Analysts said Japan\u2019s power chipmakers had cutting-edge technology but lacked scale as capacity was spread across many companies including Renesas, Rohm, Fuji Electric and Mitsubishi Electric, making it difficult to compete with China on cost.<\/p>\n Recommended<\/p>\n \u201cOther power semiconductor companies enjoy large-scale production capacity but in Japan, there\u2019s a lot of midsized semiconductor players,\u201d said a person close to Denso. \u201cConsolidation and M&A is much better to achieve cost efficiency and strong pricing power.\u201d<\/p>\n The Japanese government has offered generous subsidies to incentivise power semiconductor groups to launch joint ventures that can pave the way for consolidation. Denso formed one such venture with Fuji Electric in 2024.<\/p>\n \u201cDenso is aware of BYD\u2019s increasing competitiveness on semiconductors, so they are working to improve SoC and semiconductors they can offer to Toyota,\u201d said a government official.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Unlock the Editor\u2019s Digest for free Roula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter. Toyota\u2019s biggest supplier, Denso, has proposed a takeover of Rohm that would value the automotive chipmaker at \u00a51.3tn ($8.2bn) as it attempts to develop high-end semiconductors that are vital for electric vehicles and autonomous driving<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":46004,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[49],"tags":[4368,1532,9965,3556,23588,17673,20991],"class_list":{"0":"post-46003","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-8bn","9":"tag-bid","10":"tag-chipmaker","11":"tag-japanese","12":"tag-rohm","13":"tag-supplier","14":"tag-toyota"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=46003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46003\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/46004"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=46003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=46003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/naijaglobalnews.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=46003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}