AMD to outsource/sell Fabs (confirmed)

http://bigtech.blogs.fortune.cnn.com...gineering-amd/

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Since it can’t afford to do this anymore, AMD plans to spin off its chip manufacturing operations by year’s end, probably by hawking them outright or by inking a partnership with a larger chipmaker – a maneuver akin to selling a house and leasing it back. Meyer is vague on the exact timing of a deal, but he knows it’s probably the best thing the company can do quickly to improve its financial position, and its reputation with investors. A successful transaction would see AMD pocket a good chunk of cash, while handing manufacturing to a company that can better keep pace with Intel’s world-class operations.

“We’re going to go away from a captive fab model to more of a fables model for the CPU part of the business,” Meyer says. “Longer-term, it relieves us of the burden of having to shell out cash for these gigantic factories. So it will be more of a pay-as-you-go model like a traditional fables semiconductor company.”

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Direct form the mouth of Dirk Meyer... i wonder why this wasn't post here already...

Well I guess there won't be a new fab in NY.

Now the question is: what will they do with the money they get? Invest in some much needed research or try to strengthen their current market position? Whatever they do, this is not good for AMD as a company, I don't see how anything like this will make investors or shareholders more confident. It just means that in case of a bankruptcy there will be less assets to sell hence less money that can be recovered. I for one, if I was still a shareholder, would sell all my stock now. It's like this company is saying that it has no confidence in its own future...

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Originally Posted by Katanai

Now the question is: what will they do with the money they get? Invest in some much needed research or try to strengthen their current market position? Whatever they do, this is not good for AMD as a company, I don't see how anything like this will make investors or shareholders more confident. It just means that in case of a bankruptcy there will be less assets to sell hence less money that can be recovered. I for one, if I was still a shareholder, would sell all my stock now. It's like this company is saying that it has no confidence in its own future...

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its also bad form engeeiring pov, they are now bound to generic processes from large foundrieslike TSMC or UMC.

They have been trying to do this since last year, but the purported date keeps getting pushed back. The hold up is not their willingness to spin the fabs off, but their ability. The trick is finding someone stupid enough to put money into it. Who wants to invest in a SOI contract fab operation located in high cost Germany? In the current market environment idiots with money to throw away are a lot harder to find than they were last year. Right now I'm having a hard time seeing anyone other than the German government itself falling for this, but hey human stupidity should never be underestimated.

Oh the gap that will widen between AMD and Intel after this happens. Goodbye tweaking your process and modifying the materials for your design!

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Originally Posted by Periander6

They have been trying to do this since last year, but the purported date keeps getting pushed back. The hold up is not their willingness to spin the fabs off, but their ability. The trick is finding someone stupid enough to put money into it. Who wants to invest in a SOI contract fab operation located in high cost Germany? In the current market environment idiots with money to throw away are a lot harder to find than they were last year. Right now I'm having a hard time seeing anyone other than the German government itself falling for this, but hey human stupidity should never be underestimated.

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I think the machines in the fab are worth more than the land so... buy the fabs, strip them clean, send machines to China, sell buildings.

This is the sign I was looking for 3-4 years ago. They have been in trouble for a long time, and if they don't start selling off stuff to at least become solvent a Judge would start throwing people in prison. "In debt up to their eyeballs" wouldn't even begin to describe this company. They are over their head so far they are 200 feet below sea level.

Back when I built my last system this Ruiz guy came up with the crazy notion to take on Intel, and challenge them to a fight in the ring. Anybody remember that? Well, they got it, and not only did they get knocked out, they got finished.

They were doing really well, and we had a good level of competition going until they went and got stupid and challenged a giant that has 10's of millions if not Billions more in disposable income than they did and they got owned. :shakes: It was a very stupid thing to do.

It's really a shame. I fear that prices will soar if this company declares bankrupsy. The investors need to take over that company and fire Ruiz for starters, and get somebody in there with the sense God gave them and straiten stuff out. They should've done that years ago. Even if they did it right now it may be too late.

Selling off is just the first step to get through court without criminal charges being files. The mismanagement has gone on too long.

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Originally Posted by Meyer

“We’re going to go away from a captive fab model to more of a fables model for the CPU part of the business,” Meyer says. “Longer-term, it relieves us of the burden of having to shell out cash for these gigantic factories. So it will be more of a pay-as-you-go model like a traditional fables semiconductor company.”

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I bold out the important part.So no,they won't completely sell the fabs,but more co-manage it and share the cost with other big players(like IBM or TSMC).

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Originally Posted by T_Flight

This is the sign I was looking for 3-4 years ago. They have been in trouble for a long time, and if they don't start selling off stuff to at least become solvent a Judge would start throwing people in prison. "In debt up to their eyeballs" wouldn't even begin to describe this company. They are over their head so far they are 200 feet below sea level.

Back when I built my last system this Ruiz guy came up with the crazy notion to take on Intel, and challenge them to a fight in the ring. Anybody remember that? Well, they got it, and not only did they get knocked out, they got finished.

They were doing really well, and we had a good level of competition going until they went and got stupid and challenged a giant that has 10's of millions if not Billions more in disposable income than they did and they got owned. :shakes: It was a very stupid thing to do.

It's really a shame. I fear that prices will soar if this company declares bankrupsy. The investors need to take over that company and fire Ruiz for starters, and get somebody in there with the sense God gave them and straiten stuff out. They should've done that years ago. Even if they did it right now it may be too late.

Selling off is just the first step to get through court without criminal charges being files. The mismanagement has gone on too long.

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ruiz is already out, but meyer continues what ruiz has stated. :p:

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Originally Posted by [XC] gomeler

I think the machines in the fab are worth more than the land so... buy the fabs, strip them clean, send machines to China, sell buildings.

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They can't do this because of x-license restrictions. They are prevented from outsourcing more than a certain (unpublished) percentage of their production. They would need to retain a 51% ownership interest in the fab spin-off, then have it remain as its primary fab.

Dont know either why this hasnt been posted earlier. Although, I only check TPU mostly and now and then VR-Zone/Expreview. That link is a bit, well, unknown. To me at least.

Anyway, Ive mixed feelings about this.

It's not a new thing that having the most recources for your final product owned by your self is the best and cheapest thing. Otherwise you'll have to buy a lot of products for your final product, and all the people you buy from want to have a margin of profit.

On the otherhand, it's also not a new thing that if you actually make a deal with someone for a very large order or even an order for years, you can get a fair amount of savings from it since that producer has a guaranteed income and that's all what he wants. The buyer of that fab already has one solid customer.

Also AMD knows how much it roughly costs to get those products out of that fab so that fab really cant mess with AMD there.

But with this move, doesnt this basicly mean that this fab does not run max capacity 24/7? Otherwise I dont see the point of doing this. Also, if this fab doesnt run max capacity 24/7, why not offer to build chips for other compagnies instead?

Um, it was first mentioned(by me) when they announced asset lite, so it's really no surprise here. Also, it has been known for a while that they were forming two seperate AMD entities, one owned by AMD proper, and one owned by abu-dhabi. AMD will retain all intellectual property, abu-dhabi will produce it. This allows AMD to appear in the black on paper, while abu-dhabi takes all the loses from production. Should production kill abu-dhabi side of AMD, AMD itself will remain alive, and part of the industry.

I have mentioned for at last the last three years that the money was in the fabs, and we needed a new start-up, so it's no surprise to me that this is the direction taken, as it's been clear for years that this was the direction that Hector was taking AMD...Um, hello Motorola, once again...

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Originally Posted by informal

I bold out the important part.So no,they won't completely sell the fabs,but more co-manage it and share the cost with other big players(like IBM or TSMC).

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They already bleed like mad with their main neckartery cut open. Now they also cut the vains on their arms to survieve abit longer.

Sharing profit just makes everything harder, plus a process node you cant explicit optimize. Its a VIA #2...

And 1 of the 2 companies will sink for sure. Now its just a matter of wich one.

this was publish a month or 2 ago

I am still searching for the article but I also read an article that Dirk Meyer said he was miss quoted

but if Dirk Meyers is telling the truth or not I do not know

but a Question came to mind

with the cross license they have with intel, one of the agreement is that they have to produce 85% of their chips in house
or as stated above mas own the majority of the stocks, basically 51% percent

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Originally Posted by Periander6

They can't do this because of x-license restrictions. They are prevented from outsourcing more than a certain (unpublished) percentage of their production. They would need to retain a 51% ownership interest in the fab spin-off, then have it remain as its primary fab.

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So many people insist on this. The truth is it is far from simple. Intel is using several AMD patents in their CPUs that are cross-licensed through this very same agreement. It is far easier and less costly imo for Intel to simply agree to renew the license with new terms. Besides i don't think they have anything to loose out of this. Also i think the age of in house manufacturing seems to slowly be coming to an end. If current trends continue, a decade or two in the future i dont think any company will be able to afford in house manufacturing without also acting as a foundry.

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Originally Posted by informal

I bold out the important part.So no,they won't completely sell the fabs,but more co-manage it and share the cost with other big players(like IBM or TSMC).

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Yeah i think people are not really paying attention to what they read. That article is sensationalist journalism at it's best.

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Originally Posted by Katanai

Now the question is: what will they do with the money they get?

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2 choices:
1: pay off debts
2: use it to develop a competitive product.

option one leads to bankrupt as they wont have the money needed to develop anything new, option 2 wont work as they will be bankrupt from the debt before they get something really good out of the door.

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Originally Posted by Periander6

Who wants to invest in a SOI contract fab operation located in high cost Germany?

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depends entirely on how much the german government gives a company to move there...

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Originally Posted by cadaveca

Um, it was first mentioned(by me) when they announced asset lite, so it's really no surprise here. Also, it has been known for a while that they were forming two seperate AMD entities, one owned by AMD proper, and one owned by abu-dhabi. AMD will retain all intellectual property, abu-dhabi will produce it. This allows AMD to appear in the black on paper, while abu-dhabi takes all the loses from production. Should production kill abu-dhabi side of AMD, AMD itself will remain alive, and part of the industry.

I have mentioned for at last the last three years that the money was in the fabs, and we needed a new start-up, so it's no surprise to me that this is the direction taken, as it's been clear for years that this was the direction that Hector was taking AMD...Um, hello Motorola, once again...

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Why would anyone pay to get losses? that is the only part of the Abu-dhabi story that doesnt fit for me.

It is a lot more logical that someone like TSMC or UMC or so could get into a agreement (not actually buy) AMD fabs included the future NY fab and manage them, so they build the fabs and have to renew the machinery to get new production process. But this still has a ton of issues to solve.

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Originally Posted by Shintai

They already bleed like mad with their main neckartery cut open. Now they also cut the vains on their arms to survieve abit longer.

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I am used to you saying things that don't make a whole lot of sense, but Shintai, this comparison beats everything.

A lot of people yell things about AMD being unable to optimize their tech like they used to if they go asset light, but they don't even know how AMD plans to arrange this strategy to begin with.

Asset-light is not the same as asset-less.

I'm amazed how some folks here fail to realize how impossible is for AMD to get a good deal on their FABs :

1.AMD has $4.9B in debt
2.The Dresden complex isn't worth more than $2-2.5B. ( assuming someone is foolish enough to buy a FAB in need of upgrades and an empty shell in Germany , the most labour expensive country in Europe )

As a result ,assuming someone pays $1.5-2B for the FABs , AMD is still stuck with close to $3B in debt ( nobody is stupid to buy their debt , you can bet on this ) since they're forced to pay the credit before anything else.

End result : a FABless AMD with $3B in debt.
Positives : no investment in FABs ; better debt schedule
Negative : costs per unit will rise ; less tunning.

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Originally Posted by savantu

Germany , the most labour expensive country in Europe

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That far from right tho. Germany is rather cheap, but still alot higher than in Taiwan and China with UMC, SMC and TSMC. And Singapore is in the middle with Chartered.

Move it to Denmark and you pay twice the wage.

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Originally Posted by savantu

I'm amazed how some folks here fail to realize how impossible is for AMD to get a good deal on their FABs :

1.AMD has $4.9B in debt
2.The Dresden complex isn't worth more than $2-2.5B. ( assuming someone is foolish enough to buy a FAB in need of upgrades and an empty shell in Germany , the most labour expensive country in Europe )

As a result ,assuming someone pays $1.5-2B for the FABs , AMD is still stuck with close to $3B in debt ( nobody is stupid to buy their debt , you can bet on this ) since they're forced to pay the credit before anything else.

End result : a FABless AMD with $3B in debt.
Positives : no investment in FABs ; better debt schedule
Negative : costs per unit will rise ; less tunning.

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I hate it when people talk out of their ass, acting as if they know it all.
Germany is not labour expensive, you do not know if there will be less tuning options for AMD, you do not know if costs will rise, you do not know what investors are willing to give for different fabs.

You just do not know...
All we know is that AMD is going to try to lower their dept by using a strategy not one company has used before.

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Originally Posted by Miss Banana

I hate it when people talk out of their ass, acting as if they know it all.

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I hate it when people don't use their brain before posting.

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Germany is not labour expensive,

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Not exactly cheap either.Compared to the US , I'd think they're more expensive by any standard.
Factor in the social benefits and it's a bad choice to produce in Germany in Euros and sell in $.

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you do not know if there will be less tuning options for AMD,

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Let's assume a new entity owns the FABs.Will they produce something else there or just stick to AMD CPUs ? Obviously the former option.
If you produce something else you need a different process because different features are needed.
Can anyone afford to have multiple processes tuned for different markets ? Maybe TSMC and UMC.
Otherwise you have a generic one.

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you do not know if costs will rise,

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So AMD produces CPUs in house ; those are registered at production cost.
AMD sells the FABs and outsource its CPUs : now you pay production cost + profit margin.

Economics 101.

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you do not know what investors are willing to give for different fabs.

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You can search how much a new FAB costs , add in depreciation , labour deals , etc and you can put a very rough estimate.

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All we know is that AMD is going to try to lower their dept by using a strategy not one company has used before.

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Why not wait and see before making such absolute claims.

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Originally Posted by Miss Banana

I hate it when people talk out of their ass, acting as if they know it all.
Germany is not labour expensive, you do not know if there will be less tuning options for AMD, you do not know if costs will rise, you do not know what investors are willing to give for different fabs.

You just do not know...
All we know is that AMD is going to try to lower their dept by using a strategy not one company has used before.

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Well if it Ruiz driving this, then yes we have seen this strategy before. He did this with Motorolla when they split manufacturing from design in the 90s.

Btw, AMDs new "foundry" would be a tiny tiny tiny little player. I dont even think it would be 1% of TSMC.

The new foundry got everything against it, nothing for it.

TSMC Has been making ATI chips for like 12 years I Dunno if I'd just call them generic obviously ATI/AMD brought in some business partners

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Originally Posted by metro.cl

Why would anyone pay to get losses? that is the only part of the Abu-dhabi story that doesnt fit for me.

It is a lot more logical that someone like TSMC or UMC or so could get into a agreement (not actually buy) AMD fabs included the future NY fab and manage them, so they build the fabs and have to renew the machinery to get new production process. But this still has a ton of issues to solve.

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This is POTENTIAL LOSS. As AMD fabs are currently very busy, there should be no loss, but the potential exists. This is the key point of ASSET LIGHT...you are light in stocking ASSETS that DEPRECIATE. Intellectual property rights typically do not depreciate in value, but physical things other than buildings do. I am sure that AMD owes Germany somewhat for the loans to build the current fabs, if memory serves me right, so some debt would be gone along with the purchase of the fabs. Money from the deal lines the execs pockets, the remainder goes to pay down debt, and all is well, as they can then lay off yet more staff, and only keep key personal for future development, and likely only a few engineering teams, and some sales and execs.

In the end, we all knew this was going to come, Hector has left now that it's non-reverseable. I wish German governemnt could somehow find HIM personally liable for any loss AMD posts, becasue I think you could find most of that money in his possesion...AMD wouldn't be bleeding so much if thier execs took a severe pay hike...



And Miss Banana...there is LOTS of companies that have gone "Assest Light" before....but maybe only 1% still exist. Another way to explain assest light is selling of company property to pay teh employees...and this is exactly what is happening.

AMD's 65nm fab still cannot make those 65nm Athlon 64's as good as the 90nm ones were (with 2MB of L2 cache)! UGH, I could never understand that...

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Originally Posted by Bo_Fox

AMD's 65nm fab still cannot make those 65nm Athlon 64's as good as the 90nm ones were (with 2MB of L2 cache)! UGH, I could never understand that...

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Conventional CMOS scaling hit it's classical limit at the 130 nm to 90 nm node. In order to show any gains at 90 nm, both Intel and IBM/AMD had to implement stress engineered transistors, as it shrinks to 65 nm more of the same is required, unfortunately, the bang for the buck from stress diminishes as you get smaller. AMD threw everything but the kitchen sink into the 65 nm process, 4 different stressing technologies, and it still hasn't produced top bins to match 90 nm ....

On the flip side, Intel's 65 nm process was barely matching the 90 nm top bins as well.... the only comparisons you can make were to compare the Prescott/smithfields to the cedermill/presler ... and if you recall, neither did the 65 nm netburst exceed the 90 nm clocks... both companies got the power benefit, but the Fmax for each was not quite as forthcoming.

It's simply because simple geometric scaling doesn't work any more... the scaling has hit the limits... to get more it takes new materials and radical changes.

Jack

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Originally Posted by savantu

I hate it when people don't use their brain before posting.

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You know that when you talk out of your ass you dont need to use your brain right?

Also it's not good if you hate your self.

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Originally Posted by savantu

Not exactly cheap either.Compared to the US , I'd think they're more expensive by any standard.
Factor in the social benefits and it's a bad choice to produce in Germany in Euros and sell in $.

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Germany is globally indeed not the cheapest option to produce. But Germany is by far not expensive. Hell, even NL is already going to be more expensive.

Im not sure but Norwegian/Sweden/Denmark would be more expensive as well. Also, maybe it was cheaper to produce in Germany and ship from there around Europa instead of producing in China and ship it all back.

It's bad to sell in dollars, but producing in dollars might be just as expensive at the very same time.

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Originally Posted by savantu

Let's assume a new entity owns the FABs.Will they produce something else there or just stick to AMD CPUs ? Obviously the former option.

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I think the new owner would be more than happy to produce AMD chips since they've a guaranteed customer. Also, I dont think AMD sells their fab to the first person they meet. I think their will be a contract at least binding the fab to produce x years y quantity.

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Originally Posted by savantu

If you produce something else you need a different process because different features are needed.
Can anyone afford to have multiple processes tuned for different markets ? Maybe TSMC and UMC.
Otherwise you have a generic one.

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Depends on the capacity you got to produce for said product. If they've multiple processes around they've a widespread income. Just like farmers basicly.

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Originally Posted by savantu

So AMD produces CPUs in house ; those are registered at production cost.
AMD sells the FABs and outsource its CPUs : now you pay production cost + profit margin.

Economics 101.

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We were that far Sherlock. Now the question of more importance was, did AMD produce max capacity 24/7 or not?

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Originally Posted by savantu

You can search how much a new FAB costs , add in depreciation , labour deals , etc and you can put a very rough estimate.

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Because theory is better than practice? There are so manu uncontrollable variables in there, that's just rubbish if you go that way it is.

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Originally Posted by savantu

Why not wait and see before making such absolute claims.

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Well, isnt it true then?

Yes we'll have to wait and see for the result, but the goal is pretty much clear, no?

Savantu your speculation is presented as truth, even though you don't really know what you are talking about.
This new move by AMD is far from ideal, but result of a situation that is far from ideal. What effects it will have remains to be seen.

I just hope AMD will not stop to exist at some point, this would benefit noone.

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Originally Posted by Rammsteiner

You know that when you talk out of your ass you dont need to use your brain right?

Also it's not good if you hate your self.

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The genius decided to get involved. * applauses*

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Germany is globally indeed not the cheapest option to produce. But Germany is by far not expensive. Hell, even NL is already going to be more expensive.

Im not sure but Norwegian/Sweden/Denmark would be more expensive as well.

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Why not give the Moon or the North Pole as a counterexample ?
Did it ever crossed your brain that you need an infrastructure and qualified work force for such a large project ? Germany is an engineering power house , that's why it was chosen.

Given dumb examples of more expensive countries which are not on the semiconductor train is an example of not using ones brain.

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Also, maybe it was cheaper to produce in Germany and ship from there around Europa instead of producing in China and ship it all back.It's bad to sell in dollars, but producing in dollars might be just as expensive at the very same time.

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:rofl:

That's some seriously twisted logic in there.What are the labour costs in Germany vs. China ? Or the utilities cost ?
Did it occur to you that Asia Pacific is the main growth region of the world ?

Why do you think Intel builds a FAB in China ?

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I think the new owner would be more than happy to produce AMD chips since they've a guaranteed customer. Also, I dont think AMD sells their fab to the first person they meet. I think their will be a contract at least binding the fab to produce x years y quantity.

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No sh*t Sherlock ; who would have thought of that ?

The new owner will charge AMD more ( to recoup its investment and fuel future R&D ) and will fab other products in order to get a lower fixed cost per product.

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Depends on the capacity you got to produce for said product. If they've multiple processes around they've a widespread income. Just like farmers basicly.

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:ROTF:

Probably a new process is worth as much as a few tons of seed.

A new process my dear Watson costs $1-1.5B to develop.To get an ROI on that , you need revenues 4-6x larger.Nobody would develop a specialized new process that will bring a few hundred million $ ; it's not worth it.For such a small foundry it's obvious they will stick to a generic one.

Heck , even TSMC produces Nvidia parts in a generic 65nm process.

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We were that far Sherlock. Now the question of more importance was, did AMD produce max capacity 24/7 or not?

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Not even close ; this was mentioned clearly in the last earnings conference call.

Dear Savantu,

You said:

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germany ... the most labour expensive country in Europe

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which is complete and utter bull:banana::banana::banana::banana:.

Then Rammsteiner made the far more nuanced and truthfull comment:

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Germany is globally indeed not the cheapest option to produce. But Germany is by far not expensive. Hell, even NL is already going to be more expensive.

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After which you blast him with this comment

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Given dumb examples of more expensive countries which are not on the semiconductor train is an example of not using ones brain.

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This is disrespectful and silly of you, since your points have been poor, the supporting sources or explanations for your various "know it all" statements nonexistant, and your attitude mocking.
And putting smilies after sentences in which you feel you have dissed someone really makes you look a lot younger than you really are(unless you really are 12), regardless of whether or not you actually managed to diss someone, which is mostly not the case.

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Originally Posted by Miss Banana

Dear Savantu,

You said: which is complete and utter bull:banana::banana::banana::banana:.

Then Rammsteiner made the far more nuanced and truthfull comment:

After which you blast him with this comment

This is disrespectful and silly of you, since your points have been poor, the supporting sources or explanations for your various "know it all" statements nonexistant, and your attitude mocking.
And putting smilies after sentences in which you feel you have dissed someone really makes you look a lot younger than you really are(unless you really are 12), regardless of whether or not you actually managed to diss someone, which is mostly not the case.

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He is right. Try find the needed workers with the skills in those higher payed countries. Remember volume is the key here. We couldnt even build a fab here in Denmark since it would be delayed 2 years or so just due to lacking construction workers. Then you could use 10 years to try and hire some 5000 employees for it.

And Rammsteiner didnt make a nuanced and truthful comment. It was just utter rubbish. Unless this is Xtremefictions.org

Anyway, these changes for AMD means they can most likely fill some of their unused fab capasity with other products. Maybe even pull the Radeon GPUs home. But one thing is sure, this is very very bad for their CPU business future. Unoptimized processes, shifting volume depending on outside contracts. maybe even have to shift some around to foreign foundries aswell.

I wonder what company will keep the debt or how much each. Not even to talk about who will invest. Or if its just open the AMD fabs for outside contracts to utilize their lines for something.

Less personal BS, and underhand snide comments in these posts boys...

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Originally Posted by savantu

Why not give the Moon or the North Pole as a counterexample ?
Did it ever crossed your brain that you need an infrastructure and qualified work force for such a large project ? Germany is an engineering power house , that's why it was chosen.

Given dumb examples of more expensive countries which are not on the semiconductor train is an example of not using ones brain.

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So NL is like in the middle of nowhere? Hell, NL is a lot better than Germany and yet they chose Germany. And it's not like NL isn't an 'engineering' powerhouse. So obviously Germany had to offer something awesome to chose it over NL.

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Originally Posted by savantu

That's some seriously twisted logic in there.What are the labour costs in Germany vs. China ? Or the utilities cost ?
Did it occur to you that Asia Pacific is the main growth region of the world ?

Why do you think Intel builds a FAB in China ?

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Well, do you know? And still, shipping of recources and productions costs a lot.

And whether Intel is building a FAB in China or not, Intel is not like 'the example' for the rest of the world of what the best thing to do is.

And duh, of course do I know Asia is pretty much of high interest nowadays, doesnt change that because of that there's nothing in the west anymore?

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Originally Posted by savantu

No sh*t Sherlock ; who would have thought of that ?

The new owner will charge AMD more ( to recoup its investment and fuel future R&D ) and will fab other products in order to get a lower fixed cost per product.

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What's new? You're exactly saying what I said:ROTF:

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Originally Posted by savantu

Probably a new process is worth as much as a few tons of seed.

A new process my dear Watson costs $1-1.5B to develop.To get an ROI on that , you need revenues 4-6x larger.Nobody would develop a specialized new process that will bring a few hundred million $ ; it's not worth it.For such a small foundry it's obvious they will stick to a generic one.

Heck , even TSMC produces Nvidia parts in a generic 65nm process.

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Damn, do I really have to chew everything before you can swallow it or what. Of course there's homework to be done to investigate if there's profit to be made out of other products. My dad is some sort of project manager over various plants in Europe. So no need to explain me that.

But yet, it depends on the 'will' and the 'can'. It's risky to invest loads of money in another production line but if you can make profit out of it after 5~10 years it's a matter of willing to do it and it's understandable if you actually wont (it's risky after all).

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Originally Posted by savantu

Not even close ; this was mentioned clearly in the last earnings conference call.

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Well, there we go. Dont see the point of discussing this all if that was basicly the most important thing.

And oh yes, btw, Im prolly a bad 'fanboy' cause I dont pay any attention about fabs this and stuff that... *sigh*

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Originally Posted by informal

I bold out the important part.So no,they won't completely sell the fabs,but more co-manage it and share the cost with other big players(like IBM or TSMC).

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I'd like to see IBM acquire AMD straight out.

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Originally Posted by Perp

I'd like to see IBM acquire AMD straight out.

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But IBM and their stockowners dont share your idea :p:

But this split may make it easier for nV to aquire AMD....

So amd turns to dickless fabless :banana::banana::banana::banana::banana: :( Maybe even goign small like via? :/

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Originally Posted by cadaveca

But this split may make it easier for nV to aquire AMD....

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Oh man,tell me you were just joking...

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Originally Posted by informal

Oh man,tell me you were just joking...

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well if we go after numbers hes not that wrong, if the split of the fabs, thats most of there inventorie. If they they eliminate so much of there value, im sure the sharepirce will reflect that with a course of 2-3$ practically cut the marketcap in half (from 3,5Bn$ to ~1,75Bn$)

Why don't we wait for the actual "sell-off" of the AMD fabs (good luck with that) before we proclaim Nvidia a new owner of AMD.But please,don't let me stop you,it is quite amusing to read all of this :D.

49% control of AMD proper and like 85% of abudhabi holdings might be a way to skirt the X86 license problem. They'd have controlling interest overall, but less than what the Agreement from Intel requires.


Cutthroat, sure, but this is nV and Hector we are talking about...they just need to wait for Intel to release VGA so as to not create a monopoly of the market(By using cpu division, could possibly be legality issues):shrug:


This is business, plain and simple, and wages are made on deals, not products, for these guys. Let's be honest about this...the industry be damned when you are close to retirement...

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Originally Posted by Perp

I'd like to see IBM acquire AMD straight out.

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No need, maybe just take the partnership to another level.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/amd...ntel,6175.html

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Originally Posted by informal

I bold out the important part.So no,they won't completely sell the fabs,but more co-manage it and share the cost with other big players(like IBM or TSMC).

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I think this is for the best. This allows AMD to put more money into R&D and should reduce costs. Bad news is alot of people will probably get laid off. :(

AMD turned from harmless to a competitor with TSMC, IBM, UMC etc. I dont think the partnership will be as strong as before there.