Lexar shareholders given OK to vote on Micron deal

BOISE — Micron Technology Inc., the computer chipmaker that plans to buy Lexar Media Inc., said Tuesday the Securities and Exchange Commission has cleared the way for Lexar shareholders to vote on the proposed transaction next month.

The vote is slated for June 2.

The SEC has signed off on the prospectus for the transaction that will be sent to Lexar shareholders, allowing the vote to proceed, Micron spokesman Dan Francisco said.

Micron, the No. 4 maker of computer memory chips, is based in Boise, while Lexar, which makes flash memory devices, is in Fremont, Calif.

Micron said in March that it wants to buy Lexar for about $688 million in stock in order to distribute the California company's NAND products directly to consumer markets. Micron is expanding in flash memory products — partially through a plant in Lehi — to lessen its dependence on dynamic random access memory, where price and demand fluctuations have led to unstable revenue and profit.

Not everybody is in favor of the Lexar sale.

Billionaire investor Carl Icahn, who owns about 6 percent of Lexar, has said he believes Micron hasn't offered enough money and last month announced potential discussions with other shareholders and Lexar management to consider alternatives to the sale.

Micron says the offer is fair.

Neither the Federal Trade Commission nor the Department of Justice raised objections to the transaction by the April 25 deadline.