I think it should be clear by now that the remaining companies in the "consortium" are there because they want time to get "up to speed" when it comes to manufacturing Rambus, the ones that were sitting on their hands are paying a price now, and can only see the delay as a "window of opportunity". But the way I see it is that, the window is closing down fast and instead of pushing "anything but RMBS", not only is window going to close on them, but for some, the curtains will be drawn. I feel for the commodity DRAM makers operating on razor thin margins, but the lack of strategic thinking will cost them in the long run.
I don't know whether this is a good analogy or not, but back in the 70's when the American automobile manufacturers were under pressure from the Japanese they had two choices. Give consumers more of the same and watch their market share shrink even more, OR make the necessary investment in design and manufacturing so that they could win back their market. It took some vision on their part and a willingness to "bite the bullet" when it came to sacrificing some near term profitability for long term growth.
Again, I'm not sure it's a good analogy and I know there are some out there that believe that this is as "good as it gets" in computing or better stated as good as it needs to be. If that's true, maybe there is no real need for RMBS except for in the very high end, but we know better. Unless and until somebody else comes up with a better bus solution, RMBS is in the drivers seat.
bp |
