NXP Semiconductors N.V.

Within Philips

In 1953, the Dutch technology company Philips started a small scale production facility in the center of the city of Nijmegen as part of its main industry group "Icoma" (Industrial Components and Materials). By the early 1950s, it had acquired a strong position in the European semiconductor market. However, by the end of the decade, this lead had been effectively lost to other companies across increasingly competitive transistor market, compelling Phillip's management team to adopt a new strategy. Changes in its R&D and manufacturing capabilities soon enabled the company to deliver point-contact and layer transistors to the market as well as to develop its own high-frequency transistor.

By the early 1960s, Philips' capacity to innovate in the field of applications as well as adapt transistor requirements to suit customer needs had been hampered by its organizational structure. In 1965, Icoma became part of a new Philips main industry group "Elcoma" (Electronic Components and Materials). In 1975, Silicon Valley –based Signetics was acquired by Philips. Signetics claimed to be the "first company in the world established expressly to make and sell integrated circuits" and inventor of the 555 timer IC. At the time, it was claimed that through the Signetics acquisition, Philips had become the second largest semiconductor manufacturer in the world.

In 1987, Philips became Europe's largest semiconductor manufacturer. One year later, all of Philips semiconductor subsidiaries, including Signetics, Faselec (in Switzerland) and Mullard (in the UK), were merged in the newly formed product division Components. In 1991, the semiconductor activities were split off from Components under the name Philips Semiconductors. In 1992, Philips and Motorola established the Semiconductor Miniature Products factory in Seremban, Malaysia, as a joint venture.

In June 1999, Philips acquired VLSI Technology in exchange for $1 billion; this transaction resulted in Philips becoming the world's sixth largest semiconductor company.

Independent company

2000s

In December 2005, Philips announced its intention to spin-off Philips Semiconductors into an independent legal entity. In September 2006, Philips completed the sale of an 80.1 percent stake in Philips Semiconductors to a consortium of private equity investors consisting of KKR, Bain Capital, Silver Lake Partners, Apax Partners and AlpInvest Partners. The new company name NXP (from Next eXPerience) was announced on 31 August 2006, and the company was officially launched during the Internationale Funkausstellung (IFA) consumer electronics show in Berlin. The newly independent NXP was ranked as one of the world's top 10 semiconductor companies.

In February 2007, NXP announced that it would acquire Silicon Laboratories ’ AeroFONE single-chip phone and power amplifier product lines to strengthen its Mobile and Personal business in exchange for $285 million in cash. The next year, NXP announced that it would transform its Mobile and Personal business unit into a joint venture with STMicroelectronics; in 2009, following ST's purchase of NXP's 20 percent stake, this business unit became ST-Ericsson, which was itself a 50/50 joint venture of Ericsson Mobile Platforms and STMicroelectronics. In April 2008, NXP announced it would acquire the set-top box business of Conexant to complement its existing Home business unit. In September 2008, NXP announced that it would restructure its manufacturing, R&D and back office operations, resulting in 4,500 job cuts worldwide. In October 2009, NXP announced that it would sell its Home business unit to Trident Microsystems.

NXP was the co-inventor of near field communication (NFC) technology, along with Sony and Inside Secure, and had supplied NFC chip sets that enables mobile phones to be used to pay for goods, and store and exchange data securely. NXP manufactures such chips for eGovernment applications such as electronic passports; RFID tags and labels; and transport and access management, with the chip set and contactless card for MIFARE used by many major public transit systems worldwide.

2010s

On 26 July 2010, NXP announced the acquisition of the British RF specialist Jennic. One month late, NXP announced its initial public offering on the Nasdaq, which involved 34 million shares priced at $14 each. In December 2010, NXP announced that the pending sale of its Sound Solutions business to Knowles Electronics, part of Dover Corporation, for $855 million in cash.

In April 2012, NXP announced its intent to acquire electronic design consultancy Catena to work on automotive applications. Three months later, NXP sold its high-speed data converter assets to Integrated Device Technology. During 2012, revenue for NXP's Identification business unit reached $986 million, a 41 percent rise from 2011, which was partially attributed to the growing sales of NFC chips and secure elements. On 4 January 2013, NXP and Cisco announced their investment in Cohda Wireless, an Australian company focused on car-to-car and car-to-infrastructure communications. That same month, NXP announced it would enact between 700 and 900 redundancies worldwide in an effort to cut costs related to "support services". In May 2013, NXP announced that it acquired Code Red Technologies, a provider of embedded software development such as the LPCXpresso IDE and Red Suite.

On 23 December 2013, NXP Semiconductors was added to the Nasdaq-100 index.

In July 2014, NXP reported to have terminated the employment of union organizers, and a campaign was started for their reinstatement. One year later, a joint venture with the Beijing JianGuang Asset Management Co. Ltd. was registered in Shanghai, China under the name WeEn Semiconductors. WeEn Semiconductors has been involved in the production of bipolar and SiC power semiconductors, TRIACs, and IGBT modules.

In March 2015, a merger agreement was announced between NXP and Freescale Semiconductor.

On 14 June 2016, it was announced that Nexperia would be divested from NXP to a consortium of financial investors consisting of Beijing Jianguang Asset Management Co., Ltd (“JAC Capital”) and Wise Road Capital LTD (“Wise Road Capital”). Prior to the divestiture of Nexperia, NXP has been a volume supplier of discrete and standard logic devices, celebrating its 50 years in logic (via its history as both Signetics and Philips Semiconductors) in March 2012.

In March 2015, a merger agreement was announced through which NXP would merge with competitor Freescale Semiconductor. As part of the merger, NXP's RF Power activities were sold to JAC Capital for US$1.8 billion and rebranded as Ampleon, in a transaction closed in November 2015. Both NXP and Freescale had deep roots stretching back to when they were part of Philips (NXP), and Motorola (Freescale) respectively. Both had similar revenue; US$4.8 billion and US$4.2 billion in 2013 for NXP and Freescale, respectively with NXP primarily focusing on near field communication (NFC) and high-performance mixed signal (HPMS) hardware, and Freescale focusing on its microprocessor and microcontroller businesses, and both companies possessing roughly equal patent portfolios. On 7 December 2015, NXP completed the merger with Freescale Semiconductor; the merged company continued its operation as NXP Semiconductors N.V.

On 27 October 2016, it was announced that Qualcomm would attempt to buy NXP for $44 billion, which at that time would have been the biggest semiconductor takeover globally. In April 2017, Qualcomm received approval from U.S. antitrust regulators for the acquisition of NXP for $47 billion. The acquisition still required the approval of Chinese authorities, thus Qualcomm refiled an antitrust application and request to purchase with the Chinese Ministry of Commerce. However, Qualcomm subsequently chose to cancel the acquisition entirely on 26 July 2018.

In order to protect against potential hackers, NXP offers gateways to automotive manufacturers that prevent communication with every network within a car independently. The i.MX 8 was announced in early 2017, based around three products; all versions includes one or two Cortex-A72 CPU cores and all versions includes two Cortex-M4F CPU cores.

In September 2018, NXP announced that it acquired OmniPHY, a provider of automotive Ethernet subsystem technology. On 6 December 2019, NXP announced the completion of the acquisition of the wireless connectivity assets from Marvell Technology.

During 2019, NXP acquired the wireless connectivity assets of Marvell Technology.

2020s

On 18 June 2020, NXP announced HoverGames Challenge 2: Help Drones Help Others. One month later, NXP delivered secure and scalable edge-connected platforms based on its i.MX RT crossover processors and Wi-Fi/Bluetooth solutions.

In 2021, NXP was added to the S&P 500 stock index.

On 5 January 2023, NXP introduced industry-first 28 nm RFCMOS radar one-chip for safety-critical advanced driver-assistance system (ADAS) applications, with DENSO leveraging it to build advanced ADAS platforms. NXP and Foxconn opened a joint laboratory in December 2023 in the Foxconn Nankan Facility in Taiwan, marking a new milestone in the companies’ strategic collaboration for software-defined electric vehicle development.