University's deal spree exposes Zhao as chip billionaire

The man spearheading China's government-sponsored drive to buy foreign chip technology has revealed himself as a billionaire in the process.

Zhao Weiguo tapped connections at his alma mater Tsinghua University, whose alumni include China's two most recent presidents, to make acquisitions and amass a $2 billion fortune, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. Tsinghua Unigroup Ltd, a unit of the university's holding company of which Zhao is chairman, signed a $1.45 billion deal with Intel Corp last year and was shortlisted to buy more than $2.5 billion of Hewlett-Packard Co assets, people familiar with the matter have said.

China, with 1.3 billion mobile-phone accounts, is seeking to build its domestic chip industry and reduce reliance on overseas producers. Chinese companies led by Unigroup have tapped that State support for most of the $6.1 billion in major chip-related takeovers they have made during the past two years, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.