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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Fred Fahmy who wrote (64839)	7/12/1999 8:47:00 AM
From: Process Boy	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1579994

Fred - <AMD products are not what held back AMD. They have always had decent competitive products in certain segments (not all segments). Instead of taking a more reasonable low key approach, which starts by growing with the industry (afterall Intel has been growing nicely without increasing market share for years), they went up to an 800lb gorilla and said "want to fight, we're going to kick your butt". Not a very good strategy and the results speak for themselves.> I don't know about official Intel, but I myself would personally view the stated 25% undercutting as a declaration of war that has to be responded to in the most aggressive manner. I really don't know why this is so hard to understand for the AMD crowd. I agree with your assessment that AMD had / has other options regarding its business model, in fact very similar to the model you outlined. I used to post such thoughts but got out of the habit when I apparently didn't change one AMD person's mind. :-)). Yep, AMD had no choice but to undercut Intel's prices by 25% across the board.....yeah right. It's all Jerry's ego, IMO. PB

To: Fred Fahmy who wrote (64839)	7/12/1999 9:58:00 AM
From: Kevin K. Spurway	Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 1579994

Fred, Does your company own a billion dollar fab? If it doesn't, maybe you can try to understand why AMD needed to initially discount at 25%. AMD needed to RAPIDLY build market share so that its very expensive, rapidly depreciating fab wasn't just sitting there idling. AMD couldn't afford the nice slow, gradual ramp that your company has accomplished over 6 years. There was at least some financial imperative for their decisions. Of course, this is moot because the 25% discount policy no longer exists. Re: "Not a very good strategy and the results speak for themselves." I think the verdict is out and will remain so for about another year. Ever heard of Pyrrhus? Kevin

To: Fred Fahmy who wrote (64839)	7/12/1999 12:23:00 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1579994

Fred RE: " Instead we priced much more competitively, offering only a small discount and good value. We focused on certain vertical markets and became very successful with those customers by having innovative products." Frontier airlines used the same approach in Denver (Frontier is headquartered in Denver) against United (which has a major base in Denver). Frontier concluded early on (after losing money) that they did not stand a chance if they went head to head with the giant, United, so they offered only a small discount in prices and used their smaller size to provide better scheduling and innovation. This approach has been very effective for them as well. With the company in turnaround, profits are growing dramatically and its stock price has quadrupled in the past year. ted