ted, re:<Man, who would have thought back last June that AMD would pull it off>
That reminds me of the last "contest" on this thread where we tried to predict the Athlon's introduction. All the AMDites thought it was June XX, but, in reality it was August.
That just goes to show that it is NOT necessary for AMD to execute perfectly. I mean, if the K62+ was delayed until April, it wouldn't kill the quarter. If IBM stopped selling PC's entirely, it would hurt, but not kill the quarter, etc., etc.
With competitive products across the entire spectrum of CPU's (except servers), there is more margin for error. I liked this exchange, taken from JC's transcript:
Q: Why are you so confident in the future, given tendency to have great quarters and then fall
back down? -- A: Issues of inconsistent execution largely involved being unable to compete in the market. Didn't have an offering in the higher ASP space to offset lower end parts, and now we do. 180nm ramp is going well, >80% Athlon units this Q will be 180nm. Always issues, still will be a challenge. Copper gives better speed distribution. Yield on test runs actually higher than on Austin production runs. Strong environment, great product, it's all coming together. Well aware of concerns, working very hard to avoid missteps.
And then, later in the call:
Q: [chat about rollercoaster effect, how will we avoid the plunge?] -- A: Can't guarantee that there aren't going to be issues, but the biggest issues have been: 1) when first introduced K6, had no experience with necessary technology (end of 1997). Then Intel iterated aggressive MHz ramp in 1998 when K6-2 was introed. K6-2 was never designed to handle so fast as it is now "...and frankly we broke the part". Being a lot more conservative with introductions. Won't push the product off the cliff. 180nm going extremely well in Austin, Copper is going well in Dresden. Seasoned people. Very tough business, but still very optimistic.
Petz |
