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Technology Stocks : Advanced Micro Devices - Moderated (AMD)
AMD 221.450.0%3:59 PM EST

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To: inex who wrote (210748)9/13/2006 3:56:03 PM
From: ChrisBBo of 275872
 
As I said; I don't view it as an either-or proposition.

Had AMD spent a fraction of the ATI purchase price during the past 3+ years - developing a new CPU and speeding up capacity build-out - today, they could pick up ATI with shares alone.

Intel has stumbled for many years. AMD watching, sitting on a pile of money is inexcusable imo.
Maybe buying ATI turns out to be the best move they could make at this point in time.
My point is, that 3 years ago, saving up to buy ATI was *NOT* the best move.

It's the move of a business man. When buying ATI, he knows what he gets and what it costs.
Being an entrepreneur involves risk - maybe R&D fails and the next product turns out to be a dog, or maybe the process or fab isn't ready in time to start paying off the debt.

Hector doesn't like debt financed R&D and manufacturing capacity. He likes saving up to buy already developed IP that uses foundries - and it doesn't matter if he has to pay twice what it's worth.

Nvidia and ATI had no incentive to work with AMD in order to bring the GPU on die

I never said they did. I said the short term benefits of the acquisition could be had with a closer partnership and a few dollars.
Integration is a long term benefit, and I'm not so sure ATI wouldn't cooperate here either. They already make unique versions of their GPUs for chipsets.
Essentially, using AMD as a foundry for their mid-range GPUs could be very lucrative.
When ATI's GPUs are on AMD's advanced process, it's only a small step for AMD to become a foundry for ATI's highend discrete GPUs as well.

That leaves the question of who decides what direction future GPU development should take.
Very long term, AMD is interested in a more general purpose co-processor. Maybe ATI isn't, and that's a potential for conflict.

Finally, taking ATI off the table, removes the risk of ATI playing AMD and Intel out against each other.
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