Start with the unit attached to the number. On March 13, 2017, Intel and Mobileye announced an acquisition agreement specifying $63.54 in cash for each ordinary share. The release described approximately $15.3 billion as equity value and $14.7 billion as enterprise value. Those are separately labeled transaction measures, not three alternative prices for a share. [intel-mobileye]

Next separate agreement from completion. Both boards had approved the transaction, and Intel intended to pay from cash on its balance sheet. The companies expected closing within nine months, subject to regulatory approvals and other closing conditions. The absence of a financing condition did not remove those remaining conditions or turn the expected timetable into a guaranteed completion date. [intel-mobileye]

The engineering calendar began earlier. On January 4, BMW, Intel and Mobileye had announced plans for approximately 40 autonomous BMW test vehicles by the second half of 2017. BMW 7 Series trials were to start in the United States and Europe. That announcement documents cooperation preceding the acquisition agreement; it does not establish that the fleet was running on March 13. [bmw-testfleet]

A compact reading note can now keep two lines straight: the March agreement, its consideration and closing conditions; and the January test announcement, its vehicles, geography and forecast. Neither line supplies the completion evidence for the other. In this retrospective, preserving those labels explains more than collapsing both developments into a claim that Intel had already bought a working autonomous-car fleet. [bmw-testfleet][intel-mobileye]

Source documents

  1. Intel to Acquire Mobileyehttps://www.intc.com/news-events/press-releases/detail/243/intel-to-acquire-mobileye
  2. BMW Group, Intel and Mobileye will have autonomous test vehicles on the roads by the second half of 2017https://www.press.bmwgroup.com/global/article/detail/T0266961EN/bmw-group-intel-and-mobileye-will-have-autonomous-test-vehicles-on-the-roads-by-the-second-half-of-2017?language=en