The Korean antitrust regulator has requested additional information from US-listed semiconductor companies Skyworks Solutions and Qorvo as part of an extensive review of their USD 10.1bn cash and share deal, an official at the regulator told this news service.

The comment comes after the communications specialist chip suppliers confirmed in December they had filed notification of their deal with the Korea Financial Trade Commission, China and Taiwan. Skyworks’ recommended stock and cash acquisition of domestic peer Qorvo was announced on 28 October.

The KFTC’s regular merger review process lasts an initial 30 days but can be extended by a further 90 days. A request for additional information suspends the review clock.

The official did not clarify exactly how long the review has been to date.

While most deals are reviewed within the KFTC’s 120-day window, some, including semiconductor mergers, can go significantly beyond this time frame as shown in this 2022 analysis.

US-based radio frequency front-end (RFFE) semiconductor manufacturer Skyworks reported global revenue of USD 4bn in the fiscal year ended 3 October 2025, with USD 190m coming from South Korea. It’s takeover target and domestic peer Qorvo reported global revenue of USD 3.7bn for its fiscal year to 29 March 2025. It does not provide a breakdown of sales in South Korea.

M&A between foreign companies with total assets or sales of at least KRW 300bn (USD 210mn), where each deal party has at least KRW 30bn (USD 21mn) revenue from South Korea, are subject to the KFTC’s merger review.

The KFTC requires mandatory pre-closing notification when one or more of the deal parties exceeds KRW 2tn (USD 1.35bn) in assets or global revenue. In such cases, the completion of the deal is prohibited until KFTC’s review results are notified, and fines will be imposed for violating such prohibition of performance.

The parties anticipate the transaction to close early in the calendar year 2027.

Skyworks and Qorvo did not immediately respond to requests for comment.