Intel’s missed bet: Tower Semiconductor now worth $18.4 billion
Israeli chipmaker triples in value after collapsed $5.4 billion acquisition deal.
Tower Semiconductor has become Israel’s third most valuable publicly traded company after a sharp rise in its share price over the past week. The company is now valued at $18.4 billion, surpassing Check Point Software Technologies and trailing only Teva Pharmaceutical Industries and Elbit Systems.
The milestone follows a sustained rally in Tower’s stock. Shares have risen nearly 35% since the start of 2026 and are up more than 316% over the past year. At its current valuation, the company is worth more than three times the $5.4 billion that Intel had agreed to pay to acquire it in 2023, before the deal collapsed.
The share gains come after a year of steady financial improvement. In the fourth quarter of 2025, Tower reported revenue of $440 million, up 14% from the same period a year earlier. Gross profit rose 27% to $118 million, while operating profit increased 39% to $71 million. Net profit reached $80 million, a 48% year-on-year increase.
For the full year, revenue grew 9% to $1.6 billion, while net profit rose 6% to $220 million.
Tower has also projected continued growth into 2026. The company expects first-quarter revenue of $412 million, representing an increase of about 15% compared with the same period last year.
Alongside its financial performance, Tower has outlined significant investment plans. The company previously announced $650 million in capital expenditure and added a further $270 million to expand infrastructure for silicon photonics production.
It has also entered a collaboration with Nvidia to supply silicon photonics components, linking its growth to increasing demand for data infrastructure.
At the same time, Tower disclosed last month that Intel intends to withdraw from a 2023 agreement to manufacture wafers for its customers in New Mexico.
The contract envisioned Tower investing $300 million in equipment for Intel’s Rio Rancho site, securing capacity of more than 600,000 photo layers per month to support next-generation 300-mm chips.
The agreement came less than a month after both companies abandoned their merger plans when the proposed acquisition failed to win regulatory approval in China. Intel paid Tower a $375 million termination fee, but the manufacturing pact was seen as a way to preserve commercial ties and bolster Intel’s ambitions to expand its foundry business.
