EEtimes posts top ten of troubled semicon companies

[saaya]

http://www.eetimes.com/news/latest/s...7700881&pgno=1

AMD
ATE
Cadence
Chartered
Freescale
Infineon
Magma
Renesas
SMIC
TMC (Taiwan DRAM vendors Inotera, Nanya, Powerchip, ProMOS, Winbond)

and then they add that the following arent really much better off either:
ASAT
ASMC
Asyst (Chapter 11)
Axcelis
Electroglas
Elpida
Hynix
Lam
Mattson
Micron
MIPS
Novellus
NXP
Photronics
Qimonda (Chapter 11)
Spansion (Chapter 11)
Sony
UMC

wow... ive heard that all those companies were in trouble, but now seeing them in a list really makes me realize how troubled the semiconductor industry is and how much it will continue to consolidate...

its hard to think of semicon companies that arent in trouble...

Intel
IBM
Toshiba
Samsung
ARM

actually thats it... i cant think of anybody else? :S

[Smartidiot89]

its hard to think of semicon companies that arent in trouble...

Nvidia

actually thats it... i cant think of anybody else? :S

Dude, are you serious?

[zanzabar]

NV is in serious legal trouble not that they will go bankrupt they have alot of cash on hand and contracts with heavy fees to not use their parts even though the oems know that the chipsets are defective they still have to take the shipments

[saaya]

Dude, are you serious?

well, i thought of nvidia as in trouble tbh
but so far they are holding up, they are much better off than most if not all companies on that list.

but your right, nvidia is in trouble too... delayed and cancelled products, tscm 40nm, no x86 license, no x86 partner company... no more chipsets... gpgpu not really kicking off... they arent in as much trouble right now as others but soon will be from the looks of it...

[Hornet331]

No suprise, to find a lot of dram/flash manufacturers on that list.

[Jamesrt2004]

AMD n TMC don't seem in too much trouble in my eyes..

same with sony lol.... they just lost LOADS of money cos ps3 flopped ... hardly in trouble :/

[Shintai]

AMD n TMC don't seem in too much trouble in my eyes..

same with sony lol.... they just lost LOADS of money cos ps3 flopped ... hardly in trouble :/

TMC, not TSMC.

[Chad Boga]

AMD . . . .don't seem in too much trouble in my eyes..

Have you missed every single one of their Profit & Loss statements for the last 18 months?

[saaya]

read the link on the eetimes article in the amd paragraph... despite catpuring market share they lost 400million in q1 or something...

[Smartidiot89]

Have you missed every single one of their Profit & Loss statements for the last 18 months?

read the link on the eetimes article in the amd paragraph... despite catpuring market share they lost 400million in q1 or something...

ALOT due to the GlobalFoundries spin-off. AMD will continue to loose cash cause of GlobalFoundries for a while.

[vinister]

I think AMD are banking on the fact that by capturing market share, they now have a bank of people on AM2 platforms. Using cheap chip pricing they are trying to ensure they will have customers for the next few years. Its a risky strategy and leads to short term losses, but really I think it is their only chance. The economy should pick up, looks like we have WW3 kicking up these days so that should be profitable.

[saaya]

ww3? oh what, is cnn and bbc spinning the south korea OMGWEAREALLGONNADIEEEEE hype again?

well whats the point of luring people to am2, amd should try to get people onto am3 since thats the new platform, right?

[003]

well, i thought of nvidia as in trouble tbh
but so far they are holding up, they are much better off than most if not all companies on that list.

but your right, nvidia is in trouble too... delayed and cancelled products, tscm 40nm, no x86 license, no x86 partner company... no more chipsets... gpgpu not really kicking off... they arent in as much trouble right now as others but soon will be from the looks of it...

Nvidia better stay afloat for the G300 release! I want one! Really I can't see them going down... and as for X86... I think they do have something up their sleeve.

[Chad Boga]

ALOT due to the GlobalFoundries spin-off. AMD will continue to loose cash cause of GlobalFoundries for a while.

How or why is their efforts with GlobalFloundries the main reason for them losing money?

[flutie98]

I hope Photronics doesn't go under... All my masks come from them...

[Russian]

Dude, most of the semiconductor companies on that secondary list are Dram manufacturers... which isnt surprising considering how badly they raped themselves with that DDR2 Glut.

[XmikeX]

Intel..............
Samsung........
Toshiba.......... (HD-DVD )
IBM...............

AMD........
Sony............
Freescale.....
Infineon.......
MIPS............
Qimonda......
Elpida..........
Hynix...........
UMC.............
Chartered.....
Spansion......

Micron..

XmX

[metro.cl]

Never thought that candence could be in that list :S

You missed ARM Sascha

[saaya]

Micron..

XmX

yeah, i feel the same... micron has been losing money for years and years, yet they have some of the best and at times THE best dram available... i still dont get how those two things can happen at the same time... how can you have the best product available and lose money big time?

Never thought that candence could be in that list :S
You missed ARM Sascha

what exactly does candence do actually?
you mean arm as in doing good right? yeah good point, ill add them

[zanzabar]

i thought that qibmonda and infineon were the same company, did something funny happen

[tajoh111]

ALOT due to the GlobalFoundries spin-off. AMD will continue to loose cash cause of GlobalFoundries for a while.

I thought AMD's fabs, were part of the reason they were losing so much money? I thought getting rid of them were key to reducing costs and being profitable again.

I think AMD are banking on the fact that by capturing market share, they now have a bank of people on AM2 platforms. Using cheap chip pricing they are trying to ensure they will have customers for the next few years. Its a risky strategy and leads to short term losses, but really I think it is their only chance. The economy should pick up, looks like we have WW3 kicking up these days so that should be profitable.

They didn't pick up as much marketshare, as people are simply not buying as much computers.

Phenom II has yet to touch the laptop/netbook market, which was at 50%+.

Not only that AMD doesn't have any new technology coming out for the next year or something to challenge core i5.

The effect of core i5, is that its going to reduce the margins of AMD further when they have to drop pricing to compete. That might mean AMD selling chips at a loss depending how diverse the core i5 line up is.

No one wants AMD gone but the future looks bleak, because there doesn't seem to be an end in sight. Bulldozer is 2011. That a really long time.

If larrabee turns into a smash, not only will Nvidia be the one feeling the pain, so will AMD.

Atleast NV has a chance, because the future of larrabee in unsure at this point, however, AMD is facing core i5 in the CPU mainstream market, core i7 in the server market, it has nothing in the mobile market. We are sure of the performance of both of these.

And both Nvidia and Intel in the graphic market.

[[XC] gomeler]

They didn't pick up as much marketshare, as people are simply not buying as much computers.

Phenom II has yet to touch the laptop/netbook market, which was at 50%+.

Not only that AMD doesn't have any new technology coming out for the next year or something to challenge core i5.

The effect of core i5, is that its going to reduce the margins of AMD further when they have to drop pricing to compete. That might mean AMD selling chips at a loss depending how diverse the core i5 line up is.

No one wants AMD gone but the future looks bleak, because there doesn't seem to be an end in sight. Bulldozer is 2011. That a really long time.

If larrabee turns into a smash, not only will Nvidia be the one feeling the pain, so will AMD.

Atleast NV has a chance, because the future of larrabee in unsure at this point, however, AMD is facing core i5 in the CPU mainstream market, core i7 in the server market, it has nothing in the mobile market. We are sure of the performance of both of these.

And both Nvidia and Intel in the graphic market.

People have been saying AMD is going to die since Core 2 came out and stomped A64. Phenom II is doing wonders for AMD comparatively and soon they'll be launching a new line of server chips based on 6 cores. If these chips trickle into mainstream then they'll actively compete with Core i7/i5.

Nvidia is in the worst position of them all. Intel will be integrating GPUs onto their processors, AMD will be doing the same, which leaves Nvidia to fight in the tiny discrete market and the growing mobile devices market. Unless Nvidia can create an x86 processor and embed their GPU solutions into it, they are screwed for mainstream/portable.

[Chad Boga]

soon they'll be launching a new line of server chips based on 6 cores. If these chips trickle into mainstream then they'll actively compete with Core i7/i5.

No they won't.

For the regular desktop user, a lower clocked HexCore will offer less than a higher clocked QuadCore and the Hex will be dearer as well.

[metro.cl]

yeah, i feel the same... micron has been losing money for years and years, yet they have some of the best and at times THE best dram available... i still dont get how those two things can happen at the same time... how can you have the best product available and lose money big time?


what exactly does candence do actually?
you mean arm as in doing good right? yeah good point, ill add them

Candence is a player in the EDA market of the semiconductors, they work on making software to optimize production of chips in many many ways.

Transistors layout, manufacturing improvements etc...

[metro.cl]

People have been saying AMD is going to die since Core 2 came out and stomped A64. Phenom II is doing wonders for AMD comparatively and soon they'll be launching a new line of server chips based on 6 cores. If these chips trickle into mainstream then they'll actively compete with Core i7/i5.

Nvidia is in the worst position of them all. Intel will be integrating GPUs onto their processors, AMD will be doing the same, which leaves Nvidia to fight in the tiny discrete market and the growing mobile devices market. Unless Nvidia can create an x86 processor and embed their GPU solutions into it, they are screwed for mainstream/portable.

Well AMD has stretched all of the posibilities to stay alive, no one else has done that as extreme as AMD.

They have a ton of convertible debt in stocks that will be due in a couple of years and they can't repay so AMD's stock will take a huge hit.