Petz, Mike Magee's story of 50% P4 price cuts at the end of the month is pretty dubious. Here's another story taking a more conventional line, though they still think Intel is in margin trouble, even with much more moderate cuts.
The 1.5-GHz Pentium 4 is expected to drop to the $560-$565
range, the 1.4-GHGz to $375-$380 range and the 1.3-GHz to
$265-$270.
At the end of May, Intel has previously scheduled another price cut
for processors, including the Pentium 4. "Clearly Intel is cutting
Pentium 4 prices to spur demand and help ramp the processor in
the market," said Peter Glaskowsky, processor analyst with
MicroDesign Resources, Sunnyvale, Calif.
"As yields increase, the high costs to produce Pentium 4 come
down somewhat, but I believe the big price cuts are beyond any
manufacturing cost savings. They will cut heavily into the Pentium 4
profit margins, as Intel does everyhting it can to establish it in the
market," he said.
Ironically, Glaskowsky believed the Pentium 4 profit margins are
below the much lower-priced Pentium III chips. He said in the early
stages of a new product life cycle, you would expect just the
opposite, with Pentium 4 selling at high margiins. ebnews.com |
