SoftBank Group Corp. is seeking a valuation of at least $60 billion (¥7.3 trillion) for Arm Ltd. when the business goes public, according to people familiar with the matter, aiming for a higher amount than it would have gotten from its failed sale of the chip designer to Nvidia Corp.
SoftBank is poised to appoint Goldman Sachs Group Inc., JPMorgan Chase & Co. and Mizuho Financial Group Inc. to lead a loan transaction for Arm ahead of the planned initial public offering, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because the situation is private. The firms handling the loan are likely to also have lead roles on the IPO, but the lineup isn’t final and more banks could be added, the people said.
Valuing Arm at more than $60 billion is a gambit for SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son, who acquired the business in 2016 for about $32 billion. It would mean convincing investors that Arm deserves a higher valuation than its semiconductor peers — and what the business would have fetched in the $40 billion Nvidia deal, which collapsed under regulatory pressure.