US touchscreen chip maker Synaptics rejects $4 bn bid from Chinese investment group

Synaptics Inc rejected an offer from a Chinese investment group valuing the US-based Touchscreen chip maker at nearly $4 billion, Bloomberg yesterday reported, citing people with knowledge of the matter.

The unnamed group bid $110 per share for the Nasdaq-listed company, a premium of 70-per cent to the company's Tuesday closing share price, the report said.

Synaptics, based in San Jose, California, is not interested in selling at the offer price, and may be seeking as much as $125 a share, but talks are still ongoing the report added.

A $125 per share bid would value Synaptics at $4.5 billion.

Synaptics, which has a market value of about $2.8 billion, produces chips used in touchscreen display and biometrics technologies for a large range of mobile computing, PC, entertainment and other consumer electronic devices.

It makes touchscreen display chips that are used in devices including notebook PCs, PC peripherals, mobile devices, tablets and other consumer electronics.

Its clients include companies like Acer, ke Acer, Amazon, Asus, Dell, Google, HP, HTC, Lenovo, LG, Microsoft, Nokia, Samsung, Sony, Sony Ericsson, Huawei, ZTE, BlackBerry, and Toshiba.

The company has more than 2 billion unique capacitive touch solutions in the market and has over 1,500 patents issued or pending.

A potential deal will be scrutinised by the US Committee on Foreign Investment, which has history of rejecting Chinese takeover of US technology companies.