Bart Schachter (pictured), head of US-based chip maker National Semiconductor’s corporate venturing unit, has left following its parent’s acquisition by peer Texas Instruments (TI) for $6.5bn, which completed in September.
Schachter was vice-president of corporate business development and mergers and acquisitions at National, the division incorporating corporate venturing, from 2009. He still runs Blueprint Ventures, an independent firm buying spin-outs from corporations he set up in 1999 after leaving chip maker Intel’s corporate venturing unit.
Schachter said while TI was an "important player in business development and corporate venture capital" he had left "because of [my] lack of appetite to refocus to a Dallas-centric opportunity [when] my relationships are in Silicon Valley [California]".
Gareth Keane, Schachter’s colleague at National’s corporate business development, transferred to TI in September.
Texas Instrument’s corporate venturing unit is regarded as more financial-focused than National’s strategic-orientated unit as it reports to the Treasury function. In August, however, TI backed the $48m series A round for Smooth-Stone, alongside peer ARM.