Infineon Technologies

Infineon Technologies was created as the result of a spin-off from the German engineering firm Siemens.^[4] The spin-off, which formally took place on 1 April 1999, was claimed to be the largest high-tech spin-off in Europe. It had been Siemens semiconductor division, which had experienced considerable growth during the 1990s, rising from the 19th largest semiconductor manufacturer in the world in 1993 to the tenth largest in 1999.^[6] In March 2020, Infineon's initial public offering (IPO) on both the Frankfurt and New York stock exchanges was met with strong institutional demand that led to the offering being 33 times over subscribed. Infineon raised in excess of $5 billion, despite Siemens having retained a 74 percent stake in the firm,^[7][8] making it the world's largest tech IPO at the time.^[9]

Initially, Infineon was primarily focused on the memory market, such as DRAM; this sector proved to be intensely competitive as well as volatile.^[10] Seeking to expand its footprint in this market, in January 2004, Infineon purchased the Taiwanese chip designer ADMtek in exchange for $100 million; it was the company's first acquisition in Asia.^[11][12] Shortly thereafter, a sweeping restructuring of Infineon was conducted that refocused the firm around the core businesses of automotive and industrial semiconductors; accordingly, Infineon's memory division was carved out as Qimonda AG, which remained a subsidiary of Infineon.^[10] At its height, Qimonda employed about 13,500 people and had its own listing on the New York Stock Exchange. However, following a major downturn in chip prices amid the Great Recession, Qimonda filed for bankruptcy with the district court in Munich in January 2009.^[13][14]

In July 2009, Infineon sold Wireline Communications to Golden Gate Capital to raise €250 million,^[15] resulting in the creation of Lantiq.^[16][17] Two years later, Infineon also sold off its wireless business segment to Intel in exchange for US$1.4 billion;^[18] leading to the creation of Intel Mobile Communications (IMC).^[19][20] In August 2014, Infineon agreed to buy the International Rectifier Corporation (IR) for roughly US$3 billion,^[21] which was paid one-third by cash and two-thirds by credit line;^[22] this acquisition was officially closed on 13 January 2015.^[23]

In July 2015, it was reported that Infineon was looking to sell off its 200mm wafer fab in Newport, Wales;^[24] it was ultimately sold to Neptune 6 in September 2017.^[25] In July 2016, Infineon agreed to buy Wolfspeed, a company in North Carolina, from Cree Inc. in exchange for US$850 million in cash, although this deal was eventually stopped due to U.S. security concerns.^[26][27] That same year, Infineon acquired the Dutch firm Innoluce, a specialist in MEMS and Lidar systems for use in autonomous cars.^[28][29] During 2017, it joined the recently-created 5G Automotive Association.^[30] In March 2018, Infineon sold its RF Power Business Unit to the US firm Cree Inc. in exchange for €345 million.^[31][32] Infineon announced in June 2019 that it would acquire Cypress Semiconductor for $9.4 billion.^[33][34][35]

Throughout the late 2010s and early 2020s, Infineon expanded its manufacturing capacity.^[36] During the early 2020s, the firm promoted its plans to build two additional plants in Dresden, employing 3000 staff, at a cost of €5 billion and requested a subsidy of €920 million from the German government towards its construction; in February 2025, this was approved by the European Commission, having been financed through the €4 billion European Chips Act.^[5][37]

In May 2023, Infineon acquired the "tiny machine learning" company Imagimob, a Stockholm, Sweden–based company with a platform for development and deployment of AI applications.^[38] That same year, Infineon also acquired GaN Systems, headquartered in Ottawa, Canada.^[39] In 2023, Infineon acted on an expansion plan by investing EUR 5 billion into its semiconductor fab in Kulim, Malaysia.^[40] In April 2025, Infineon bought Marvell Technology's automotive ethernet division in exchange for $2.5 billion.^[41][42]

Infineon markets semiconductors and systems for automotive, industrial, and multimarket sectors, as well as chip card and security products. Infineon has subsidiaries in the US and in the Asia-Pacific region, in Singapore, and Tokyo.

Infineon has a number of facilities in Europe, one in Dresden, Germany. Infineon's high power segment is in Warstein, Germany; Villach, Graz and Linz in Austria; Cegléd in Hungary; and Italy. It also operates R&D centers in France, Singapore, Romania, Taiwan, U.K., Ireland, Ukraine^[43] and India, as well as fabrication units in Malaysia, Singapore, Indonesia, China, Hungary, and USA, including in El Segundo and Austin, among others. There is a Shared Service Center in Porto, Portugal.^[44] Infineon is listed in the DAX index of the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. In 2023, it was Germany's largest chip manufacturer.^[5] As of 2011, Infineon comprised four business areas after several restructurings:^[45]

In 2004–2005, an investigation was carried out into a conspiracy to fix the price of DRAM between 1999 and 2002 that damaged competition and raised PC prices. In December 2004, Infineon agreed to enter a guilty plea, cooperate with the US government's investigation, and pay a $160 million fine over its role in the conspiracy.^[48][49] During mid 2005, Infineon appointed the auditing specialist Ernst & Young to review internal monitoring and information systems after the resignation of an executive over alleged bribery in the sponsoring of motor-sport events.^[50]

In 2010, legal action was filed by the insolvency administrator overseeing the insolvent Qimonda over Infineon's alleged role in its collapse;^[51] this was concluded in a settlement of €753.5 million in 2024.^[52][53]

In September 2014, the European Commission found that Infineon, Renesas and other smart card chip manufacturers had unlawfully coordinated their pricing between 2003 and 2005.^[54][55]

In October 2017, it was reported that a code library developed by Infineon contained a ROCA vulnerability. Due to it being in widespread use in security products such as smartcards and TPMs (Trusted Platform Modules), enabled private keys to be inferred from public keys. As a result, all systems depending upon the privacy of such keys were vulnerable to compromise, such as identity theft or spoofing. Affected systems include 750,000 Estonian identity cards, 300,000 Slovak identity cards,^[56] and computers that use Microsoft BitLocker drive encryption in conjunction with an affected TPM.^[57] Immediately after the disclosure, Microsoft released a patch via Windows Update that works around the flaw.^[58]