Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

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

To: Goutam who wrote (74562)	10/7/1999 6:02:00 PM
From: Jim McMannis	Respond to of 1573719

RE:""They were out in left field in the megahertz rating department," he said, meaning that Rise's chips were too slow." Rise R.I.P... No Mhz = no chance. Megahertz sells - TM McMannis

To: Goutam who wrote (74562)	10/7/1999 6:06:00 PM
From: Gopher Broke	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1573719

What is encouraging is that AMD are holding on to their trump cards. They are a couple of speed bins up on Intel and there is little point in pushing further right now. Wait and see what Cumine has to offer when it actually ships (have I heard this before somewhere?!) Do we really think that a processor that runs at 700 MHz on .25 is not going to scale up on .18? Announcing a K7 at 800 MHz was a great strategy, keeping the pot boiling with plenty in reserve. Who will want a Cumine 733 when they can have a 1 gig Athlon, whatever the benchmarks say. And what about those 8 way MP systems? There are some big bucks waiting in the sidelines there. All gone quiet doesn't mean there is nothing happening. So, why has the anxiety returned to this thread, just because Cumine is not a total loss for Intel? The competition is still very much on. What was that saying about megahertz again?

To: Goutam who wrote (74562)	10/7/1999 7:59:00 PM
From: Yougang Xiao	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1573719

Goutama: <<The company has a great product, but needs two or three more quarters to make all the vital pieces fall into place.>> The biggest pleasant surprise in the last few months, and confirmed by yesterday's CC is that the infamous AMD problem has gradually fading away: 1. On the production side, their execution is perhaps the best in the last two quarters, based on this trend, it is reasonable to assume that conversion to 0.18 would encounter less problems, if not problem free. Jerry vowed (maybe in Q2 cc) that AMD would never make the same mistake twice, and emphasis on production friendly chip design both in K7 and K8 reinforces my conviction that production problem will be a less concern going forward. 2. A more Wall Street attractive AMD is emerging. can't help noticing that Jerry and his crews have refrained from attacking Intel for their problems in the CC; on all major commitment front from 750 intro time to I Ghz, the overtone is "under-promise, over-deliver." There are also signs that AMD is trying to do a financial re-engineering for AMD. AMD's cash reserve and new credit facility would enable AMD to survive a couple of quarters at quarterly loss in 100 million range. The proceeds of comm group sale and Moto equity infusion (I still think Moto will do an equity deal with AMD re Fab 30, maybe a few strings will be attached) are most likely used to strengthen its balance sheet and timing for such financial reengineering would great when AMD return to profitibility in Q1,00. One red flag is that AMD still has not announced its new president and CTO. Is Jerry trying to balance out all internal candidates to prevent loss of talents? So, problems AMD is facing are external. Chief among them is Intel. Taiwan problem will go away sooner or later, mass demand for high performance CPU is gradually taking shape - as examplified by Jobs' hype on "desktop digital video publishing" of which both Intel and AMD based boxes can take advantage. AMD investors did not make much money in K6 days due principally to (A) AMD's own internal problem, which is fading away as we are entering into Athlon era; (B) Intel, used tricks from platform - slot 1 to segmentation - pricing presure to damage AMD. Intel's tricks on technical fronts did not work as anticipated - slot 1 did not accomplish much , SSE is mute point as 3dNOW counters nicely. The only damage did was through its pricing power in K6 days, compound by AMD's own production mishaps. Will Intel try one more time to severaly damage AMD by aggresively pricing across board from cumine to celeron under such Athlon era condition: AMD less likely to have production problem; product portfilio is much better and wider than K6 days and may have mhz lead in the next few quarters, but, with a terrible balance sheet? I don't have a definate answer to this question, here do have some pros and cons for Intel's pricing move. For: (1) Slashed celeron price substantially, yet escaped Wall Street's rage, instead awarded by the recent stock price appreciation. Intel may assume that the Street may continue to like to see their maintain market share at any cost approach, therefore, a go for CB; (2) High end boxes are increasely less in percentage among total pc shipped. The high performance chips - cumine or athlon have to take a beating in price to stimulate demand. (3) Cost of producing cumine will be lower, so in the name of passing cost to consumer, can afford to price agressively. Against: (1) Will render the segmentation strategy meaningless, therefore collaps Intel's CPU ASP. Celeron that sell for less than 100 bucks in average is already 36% among mix per Kumar, If cumine priced around 200 buck average, what kind of Intel ASP we are talking about? Will Street and shareholders like Paul, PB, Elmer tolerate such collaps of ASP? (2) Due to Athlon's possbile mhz lead in the next few quarters, Intel would have not subsidies from Desktop high end. Would Xeon be enough? (3) Intel's diversifications into comm and Internet aera have not beared any meaningful fruits yet, profits are still depend upon CPU profits. Whether Intel will get aggressive, or how aggressive with cumine and AMD's response will be terribely important to AMD's prosperity in the next few quarters and beyond.

To: Goutam who wrote (74562)	10/9/1999 5:14:00 AM
From: Paul Engel	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1573719

Goutama - Re: "a very disheartening article about the brutal price war in the X86 CPU segment. " I thought it was very heartening and uplifting. The article implied that if you started early and stuck with it, you could make good money in the x86 business - and protect yourself from Johnny-Come-Latelies-GOing-After-All-The-Goodies-type-Wannabees. So far, this seems to be working out as planned. I hear RISE now has plans to go into GOLD MINING next - they heard there's lots of money to be made - as others are now making it - and they feel they are entitled to their fair share. Paul