Advent is working on an offer to acquire U-blox Holding AG in a deal that could value the Swiss maker of positioning chips at more than 1 billion Swiss francs ($1.2 billion), according to people familiar with the matter.
An announcement could be made as soon as in the next few days, the people said, declining to be identified because the information is private. Deliberations are still ongoing and there’s no guarantee a transaction would materialize, the people said.
A representative for Advent declined to comment, while a representative for U-blox didn’t immediately respond to requests for comment.
Shares of U-blox surged as much as 19% in their biggest intraday gain since August 2022 after the Bloomberg News report. The stock is up 78% this year, giving the company a market value of over $1.2 billion.
Private equity firms have been dialing up deals in the European public markets, where valuations are seen as not reflecting business’ fundamentals. A consortium of Nordic Capital and Permira recently made a takeover bid for Copenhagen-listed vaccine maker Bavarian Nordic A/S.
For Advent, a deal for U-blox would mark another public takeover in Europe following its offers for London-traded Spectris Plc and Tinexta SpA in Italy. While Advent earlier this month walked away from a bidding war with KKR & Co. on Spectris, it signed a binding agreement, together with Nextalia, to buy a stake in Tinexta with plans to delist the company.
U-blox makes chips and modules for localization technologies used in cars, consumer electronics, autonomous machines and drones among others. It recently completed the sale of its cellular business that was loss-making in 2024. Stephan Zizala, U-blox chief executive officer, has said the firm’s future is in “automated driving and mobile robotics.”
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