[archgoon]

Apparently; when ARM was first sold to Softbank, Softbank made several guarantees to the UK. Nvidia has made no agreement to continue those guarantees.

> At that time, Softbank announced it had agreed to legally binding commitments to increase investment, headcount and preserve its headquarters in the UK.

> It is not too late for the government to impose conditions, but conversations on whether to impose them or what they might be have not even started.

[OJFord]

I would assume Nvidia bought (by obligation) those commitments too?

Otherwise it would be pointless having them in the first place, you'd just get out of it (if you wanted to) with some creative corporate governance.

[I used to work at Arm, but not on creative corporate governance.]

[toyg]

Uhm, no...? The obligation was on Softbank, not on ARM.

> you'd just get out of it (if you wanted to) with some creative corporate governance

... aand you've just "discovered" how large companies routinely get out of their commitments to politicians.

[jlokier]

> The obligation was on Softbank, not on ARM

Plausibly the obligation on Softbank could require them, when selling, to require the new buyer agree to the same obligation.

[mytailorisrich]

The UK is not in a position of strength at the moment.

Brexit might give us back 'control' from Brussels but does not exactly give us the upper hand in commercial negotiations with the US.

Now, I'm sure that Nvidia will want the deal to close smoothly and will thus be willing to give similar guarantees. Of course the trick is that these guarantees usually (and sensibly) come with a time limit, which also suits governments, so don't mean that much in fine.

[fluffything]

> Nvidia has made no agreement to continue those guarantees.

Hasn't Nvidia has actually increased those guarantees with everything they have agreed on for buying ARM?

[throwaway2048]

Do you have a source for this?

[fluffything]

The actual nvidia announcement linked in the original post? (https://nvidianews.nvidia.com/news/nvidia-to-acquire-arm-for...)

I could quote the whole post, but to satisfy UK regulators, NVIDIA committed to:

> NVIDIA will expand Arm’s R&D presence in Cambridge, UK, by establishing a world-class AI research and education center, and building an Arm/NVIDIA-powered AI supercomputer for groundbreaking research

which is much more than Softbank ever did. And the list of things they commited to goes on, and probably will continue to increase as the US and China get their says on this.

[kevin_thibedeau]

They should move HQ to Ireland to maintain easy access to the European talent pool.