Following the news that the UK government and the London Stock Exchange (LSE) are lobbying chipmaker Arm’s Japanese owner Softbank to choose London over New York for Arm’s initial public offering (IPO);

David Bicknell, Principal Analyst in the Thematic Intelligence team at GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company, offers his view:

“This move reeks of political opportunism. The UK government only has its own interests in mind—not Arm’s future. The LSE’s desire to persuade Softbank that Arm should list in London is understandable, but the chances of that happening are slim. Softbank will not rethink its New York plans (nor should it).

“At a time when the global tech market is not at its strongest, Arm needs to be able to target the destination where most investors and key semiconductor supporters such as Qualcomm are based. That is New York, not London. Following the collapse of Nvidia’s acquisition of Arm, Softbank needs investment certainty. London may want to be a global hub for tech investing, but it is not there yet.

“Softbank knows that a New York listing will serve Arm’s best interests, and it should bat away any UK government entreaties as swiftly and firmly as possible.”

Mike Orme, Consultant Analyst in the Thematic Intelligence team at GlobalData, a leading data and analytics company, offers his view:

“Masayoshi Son is targeting a $60 billion valuation for any IPO, probably next year. This might seem a bit rich for a company with current annual revenues of only $2.5 billion, but it’s hard to overestimate the significance of Arm technology to the semiconductor industry. It goes way beyond smartphones and wearables, as Nvidia could clearly see.

“Now, with Arm-based M Series Apple chips powering Mac desktop PCs—unthinkable a couple of years ago—whole new high-value markets are opening up for Arm. For instance, several chip companies have projects underway to base desktop server processors that cost thousands of dollars each on Arm blueprints.

“At the same time, Arm technology will be at the core of the so-called internet of everything by the end of this decade.

“So maybe Masayoshi isn’t overestimating Arm’s potential value, and a cluster of ace chip companies led by Apple, Qualcomm, and even Nvidia itself will educate the market about Arm’s scope and prospects come IPO time.”