Altera
Corporate brand
UnclaimedAltera is a semiconductor brand specializing in field-programmable gate arrays, system-on-chip FPGAs, programmable logic devices, and related design software.
Last updated August 26, 2026
Overview
Altera is a United States semiconductor brand whose principal products are field-programmable gate arrays (FPGAs), system-on-chip (SoC) FPGAs, complex and nonvolatile programmable logic devices, embedded processor cores, semiconductor intellectual-property blocks, and development software. Its products allow customers to configure or reconfigure digital hardware after fabrication, making them useful where fixed-function chips would be too inflexible, too slow to develop, or uneconomical at lower volumes. Typical applications include telecommunications infrastructure, networking, data-center acceleration, industrial automation, automotive electronics, aerospace and defense systems, medical equipment, embedded computing, and hardware prototyping. Founded in 1983 by Robert Hartmann, Paul Newhagen, James Sansbury, and Michael Magranet, Altera became one of the major independent programmable-logic suppliers. The company developed a broad portfolio organized around different balances of performance, capacity, power consumption, and price. Its high-end Stratix family competed in demanding communications, networking, and computing applications; Arria addressed intermediate performance and power requirements; Cyclone targeted cost- and energy-sensitive designs; and MAX products supplied nonvolatile programmable logic for control, boot, interface, and system-management functions. The company also built an ecosystem around Quartus design software, which supports hardware-description-language development, synthesis, placement and routing, timing analysis, device programming, and debugging. Altera's strategy expanded beyond standalone logic devices. It acquired intellectual-property businesses and offered reusable cores that reduced the work required to construct complete systems. It also combined FPGA fabric with hard processor systems, initially using dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 designs in Cyclone V, Arria V, and Arria 10 SoC products, and later using ARM Cortex-A53, Cortex-A76, and Cortex-A55-based systems in newer families. The company has also offered soft processor cores, including the RISC-V-based Nios V line. Its design environment has supported software-oriented acceleration through OpenCL and high-level synthesis approaches using C and C++. Altera established a technology relationship with Intel in 1984 and later acquired Intel's programmable-logic business in 1994. In 2015 Intel purchased Altera for $16.7 billion in cash, making it Intel's Programmable Solutions Group. During the Intel period, Altera products benefited from access to Intel manufacturing, packaging, processors, and interconnect technologies; the Stratix 10 family was associated with Intel's 14-nanometer process technology. Intel announced a plan in 2023 to separate the programmable-solutions operation, and the Altera name and branding were restored in 2024. The business became an independent Intel subsidiary on January 1, 2025. In April 2025 Intel announced an agreement to sell a controlling 51 percent interest to Silver Lake, cancelling the previously contemplated public offering. Silver Lake's acquisition was reported as completed on September 15, 2025, leaving Intel with a 49 percent stake. The transaction made Altera a privately held company under majority private-equity ownership while preserving Intel as a significant strategic shareholder. Altera therefore represents both a historic independent FPGA company and a continuing semiconductor business operating through a new ownership structure.
History
Altera was established in 1983 by Robert Hartmann, Paul Newhagen, James Sansbury, and Michael Magranet to develop programmable logic devices. The name referred to the alterable character of the company's chips. Rodney Smith was selected as its first chief executive. The company entered a technology relationship with Intel in 1984, licensing programmable-logic technology to the larger semiconductor manufacturer, and became publicly traded through an initial public offering in 1988. During its independent years, Altera developed a portfolio spanning field-programmable gate arrays, complex programmable logic devices, nonvolatile logic, design tools, and reusable semiconductor intellectual-property cores. Its product families were aimed at distinct market segments: Stratix for high performance and capacity, Arria for balanced performance and power, Cyclone for cost-sensitive and lower-power designs, and MAX for nonvolatile programmable logic. In 2000, Altera acquired Designpro and Northwest Logic to expand its IP-core capabilities and move toward more complete system-on-chip solutions. The company increasingly integrated processors with FPGA fabric. In December 2012 it announced shipment of Cyclone V SoC devices, combining FPGA logic with a dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor system on a 28-nanometer fully depleted silicon-on-insulator process. Similar SoC variants followed in the Arria and Stratix families. These products enabled customers to combine general-purpose processing with custom hardware acceleration, while optimizing power, board area, performance, and system cost. Altera's Quartus design environment became the common development platform for its FPGA, SoC FPGA, and CPLD products. The company also introduced an OpenCL SDK in 2013 and supported higher-level software-oriented design methods. Altera and Intel deepened their manufacturing relationship in 2013, when Altera announced that future products would use Intel foundry services and 14-nanometer tri-gate technology rather than its existing TSMC arrangement. Stratix 10 was the first major product family associated with that manufacturing transition. In December 2015 Intel acquired Altera for $16.7 billion in cash. The business became Intel's Programmable Solutions Group, combining FPGA technology with Intel processors, packaging, interconnect, and manufacturing capabilities. Intel announced in October 2023 that it would begin separating the programmable-solutions group. In February 2024 it said that the business would restore the Altera name and branding. On January 1, 2025, Altera became an independent subsidiary of Intel. On April 14, 2025, Intel announced an agreement to sell Silver Lake a 51 percent controlling interest, ending the planned IPO route. Raghib Hussain was designated to replace Sandra Rivera as chief executive, effective May 5, 2025. Silver Lake completed the transaction on September 15, 2025; Intel retained the remaining 49 percent. The resulting company is privately held and continues to develop FPGA, SoC FPGA, programmable-logic, processor-core, and design-software products.
- 2025
Independent subsidiary and new ownership structure
[1]Altera becomes an independent Intel subsidiary, then Silver Lake completes acquisition of a 51 percent controlling stake while Intel retains 49 percent.
- 2024
Altera branding restored
[1]Intel announces the return of the Altera name and brand for the separated programmable-logic business.
- 2015
Intel acquisition completed
[2]Intel purchases Altera for $16.7 billion in cash and forms the Programmable Solutions Group.
- 2013
OpenCL SDK introduced
[1]Altera makes an OpenCL software-development kit available for programming FPGA-based acceleration.
- 2012
Cyclone V SoC shipments announced
[1]Altera announces its first system-on-chip FPGA shipments, combining FPGA fabric with a dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor system.
- 2000
Expansion into semiconductor IP
[1]Altera acquires Designpro and Northwest Logic to expand reusable semiconductor intellectual-property capabilities.
- 1994
Acquisition of Intel's PLD business
[1]Altera acquires Intel's programmable-logic-device business for $50 million.
- 1988
Initial public offering
[1]Altera becomes a publicly traded company through an IPO.
- 1984
Intel technology partnership begins
[1]Altera enters a partnership with Intel to license programmable-logic technology.
- 1983
Altera is founded
[1]Robert Hartmann, Paul Newhagen, James Sansbury, and Michael Magranet establish Altera to develop alterable programmable-logic chips.
Products and positioning
A programmable-logic and FPGA solutions provider for high-performance, embedded, networking, industrial, communications, and reconfigurable-computing applications.
FPGA and SoC FPGA
Agilex
Agilex is Altera's current-generation FPGA platform family, spanning devices for data-center acceleration, networking, communications, industrial systems, and embedded applications. The range includes variants with integrated processor systems, high-speed connectivity, and differing performance and power profiles. Agilex 5 and Agilex 3 SoC products integrate ARM processor systems with programmable logic, extending the platform from configurable hardware into heterogeneous computing and embedded system-on-chip designs.
High-performance FPGA
Stratix
Stratix is Altera's high-performance FPGA family for applications requiring substantial logic capacity, high data throughput, advanced transceivers, and demanding signal-processing or acceleration capabilities. It has been used in communications, networking, data processing, and other compute-intensive systems. Stratix 10 also included SoC variants with an integrated ARM Cortex-A53 processor system.
Mid-range FPGA and SoC FPGA
Arria
Arria is positioned between Altera's highest-performance and cost-optimized FPGA families. It balances processing capability, power consumption, device capacity, and price for communications, industrial control, machine vision, embedded computing, and related systems. Arria V and Arria 10 families included SoC versions that combined programmable logic with hard ARM processor systems.
Cost-optimized FPGA and SoC FPGA
Cyclone
Cyclone is Altera's lower-cost and power-conscious FPGA family. It targets industrial equipment, displays, consumer electronics, communications devices, control systems, and embedded products where integration and predictable cost are important. Cyclone V SoC devices combined FPGA logic with a dual-core ARM Cortex-A9 processor system, allowing customers to implement custom hardware and software functions on one device.
Nonvolatile programmable logic
MAX
MAX is Altera's family of nonvolatile programmable-logic devices, used for system control, interface expansion, boot configuration, power sequencing, and other functions that benefit from immediate availability after power-up. The family complements larger FPGA products by addressing control and glue-logic requirements with devices designed around nonvolatile configuration and programmable logic.
FPGA design software
Quartus Prime
Quartus Prime is Altera's principal development environment for FPGA, SoC FPGA, and CPLD designs. It brings together hardware-description-language entry, synthesis, implementation, placement and routing, timing analysis, device programming, configuration, and debugging. The software ecosystem is central to using Altera devices because it translates customer designs into configurations for programmable hardware and supports verification and deployment workflows.
Soft processor core
Nios V
Nios V is Altera's embedded soft processor family based on the RISC-V instruction-set architecture. As a soft core, it can be instantiated within FPGA logic and tailored to the surrounding hardware design. It follows earlier Altera processor offerings such as Nios II and provides a programmable-processing option for embedded control, peripheral management, and custom FPGA systems.
Controversies
2006
Options-backdating accounting investigation
After a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission investigation, Altera restated financial results covering 1996–2005 to correct accounting errors linked to stock-options backdating. The company's chief financial officer resigned in connection with the matter.
Brand decisions
2025
Silver Lake purchases controlling interestM&ABackground
After Altera's separation from Intel, the planned public offering was replaced by a private-equity transaction.
Action taken
Intel agreed to sell Silver Lake a 51 percent controlling stake, with Intel retaining 49 percent. Raghib Hussain was announced as chief executive effective May 5, 2025.
Aftermath
Silver Lake completed the transaction on September 15, 2025, making Altera privately held and majority-owned by Silver Lake.
Controlling ownership stake. 100% Intel ownership → 51% Silver Lake; 49% Intel (September 15, 2025)
2023
Separate the programmable-solutions businessStrategyBackground
Intel announced that its programmable-solutions operation would be separated as part of a broader effort to give the business greater independence and potentially access public capital.
Action taken
Intel began planning a standalone company and initially intended to seek an IPO within three years.
Aftermath
The IPO plan was later cancelled after Intel agreed to sell a controlling interest to Silver Lake.
2015
Intel acquires AlteraM&ABackground
Altera was a major independent FPGA supplier, while Intel was seeking to expand programmable logic alongside its processor and data-center businesses.
Action taken
Intel completed an all-cash acquisition valued at $16.7 billion and placed Altera into the Programmable Solutions Group.
Aftermath
Altera operated within Intel for roughly a decade, with its products incorporated into Intel's programmable-solutions portfolio.
Acquisition value. $16.7 billion (2015)
2013
Move selected FPGA manufacturing to Intel foundry technologyStrategyBackground
Altera sought access to Intel's 14-nanometer tri-gate manufacturing process for future FPGA products and announced a change from its ongoing TSMC manufacturing arrangement.
Action taken
The companies agreed that Intel Foundry Services would manufacture future Altera products using the 14-nanometer process; Stratix 10 became the first associated product family.
Aftermath
The arrangement deepened the technical relationship that preceded Intel's later acquisition of Altera.
Recent events
- 2025
Altera becomes an independent Intel subsidiary[1]
Other
The business formally began operating as an independent subsidiary of Intel on January 1, 2025.
- 2025
Intel agrees to sell controlling stake in Altera to Silver Lake[1]
M&A · Leadership change
Intel announced an agreement to sell Silver Lake a 51 percent controlling interest, cancelling the previously planned Altera IPO and naming Raghib Hussain as the incoming chief executive.
- 2025
Silver Lake completes acquisition of majority Altera stake[1]
M&A
Silver Lake completed its purchase of a 51 percent interest in Altera, while Intel retained 49 percent ownership.
- 2024
Altera name and branding restored[1]
Leadership change
Intel announced that the separated programmable-logic business would again use the Altera name and brand identity.
- 2023
Intel announces separation plan for Programmable Solutions Group[1]
Other
Intel announced plans to operate its programmable-solutions business as a separate company and indicated that it intended to pursue a future public offering.
- 2015
Intel completes acquisition of Altera[2]
M&A
Intel completed its $16.7 billion cash acquisition of Altera, placing the business in the newly created Programmable Solutions Group.
Sources2 sources
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