According to the report, the talks fell apart as the companies could not agree on financial terms.
SiFive confirmed it does not comment on speculations but said it would continue to be Intel's partner on new chip designs. In June, a source told Reuters that Intel was debating a possible offer to buy SiFive, a company closely associated with an open-source technology called RISC-V that is challenging the rise of Intel's rival Arm Ltd.
Arm, which is being sold to Nvidia Corp for $40 billion, and SiFive sell intellectual property such as chip designs to others who ultimately produce the chips. Purchasing SiFive would have given Intel a library of intellectual property it could use both in its chips and offer to license to future customers, as it works to build a business by opening up its chip factories to outsiders.