The U.K. semiconductor firm that designed the graphics chips used in Apple Inc.’s iPhones said today it’s putting itself up for sale.

The move comes less than three months after Apple said it would no longer be using designs from Imagination Technologies Group Plc and instead would build its own. Apple confirmed in April that it had decided to replace Imagination’s PowerVR graphics processing unit that’s used across its iPhone and iPad product lines.

That announcement horrified Imagination’s investors, and the company’s share price crashed by almost 70 percent on the same day. The stock has traded more or less around that level ever since.

In the wake of Thursday’s announcement, however, Imagination’s stock jumped back up by 17 percent. Imagination said in a statement on Thursday that it has already been in contact with several possible buyers about a sale. “The Board of Imagination has therefore decided to initiate a formal sale process for the Group and is engaged in preliminary discussions with potential bidders,” the company said in the announcement.

Imagination didn’t name any of those “potential bidders,” but analysts told Reuters that Intel Corp., Qualcomm Inc., MediaTek Inc., several Chinese companies and possibly even Apple itself could all be interested.

As far as Apple is concerned, the main benefit of bringing the design and manufacture of its GPU chips in-house is financial. That’s good news for the tech giant, but for a smaller company such as Imagination, it could be a death knell if it doesn’t find an alternative path forward, analysts said.

“This is representative of the downside of having Apple as a large percentage of your business,” said Patrick Moorhead, principal analyst at Moor Insights & Strategy. “When you get Apple business it’s great, but when you lose it, it’s catastrophic.”

For its part, Imagination said it’s merely involved in a “dispute” with Apple, and reiterated this in its statement. It’s not yet known what kind of impact the company’s decision to sell itself will have on that “dispute.”

The matter is more complicated yet, as Apple reportedly owns an 8.1 percent stake in Imagination, which is described as a “holdover” from when it made preliminary moves to buy the company in 2016. That acquisition never materialized, but there remains a possibility that Apple could take a second look at buying the company.

After all, the easiest way for Apple to do its own GPU chip is to create one that resembles its predecessor. But Imagination said in April that it doubted the iPhone maker could do so without infringing on its patents. If Apple does buy Imagination, that concern would disappear.

Image: Imagination Tech