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

To: Elmer who wrote (90033)	1/27/2000 3:06:00 PM
From: Process Boy	Respond to of 1574489

EP - <Intel delayed the FW fab intentionally about 2 years ago. Looking back it was probably a mistake. In the mean time they just opened a new MegaFab in Israel, Fab18 and are in the process of converting the Hudson Mass fab over to be another Intel MegaFab. > BTW, when construction of F18 was announced, it was announced as Intel's first dedicated FLASH fab. However, Intel redirected it's mission a while back to a totally dedicated LOGIC fab. As for F16, this situation looks like a deal just gone bad. Intel will not play ball if tax incentives are not part of the equation. I don't know exactly what happened here, but it does appear to be a mistake. PB

To: Elmer who wrote (90033)	1/27/2000 4:19:00 PM
From: tejek	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 1574489

Add in the just announced 12" Fab22 to be build in Chandler Az. With the $2+ Billion price tags of a modern fab you just can't afford to have them sitting around hoping there'll be a need for them (unless you're AMD of course!). And with the 20 months Intel needs to bring a new fab online, or the 3 1/2 years AMD needs, it is very difficult to predict future needs with extreme accuracy. EP, if what we believe is true, that debt payments do not start until the Dresden fab is in production, then AMD has cut a good deal. Subsidy of new industries by provincial/state gov'ts like Saxony is fairly common particularly in the former GDR. I not saying I think they're good but it doesn't hurt that AMD benefits from this process. So why do you keep bringing it up. ted

To: Elmer who wrote (90033)	1/27/2000 8:32:00 PM
From: Dan3	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1574489

Re: With the $2+ Billion price tags of a modern fab you just can't afford to have them sitting around hoping there'll be a need for them (unless you're AMD of course!)... That beautifully sums up the difference in management philosophies at the two companies. Time will tell which approach was the correct one. Intel unquestionably saved some interest and depreciation costs Q4 99 and Q1 00 while AMD had some excess interest and depreciation costs. AMD picked up Gateway and much of the retail market, Intel's cash mountain got a little higher as it aggressively pinched pennies. The curious thing is that Intel could easily have maintained excess capacity - instead they saved a few bucks and put off expansion, while for AMD to expand was a struggle that put the company in jeopardy - but they did it anyway. It's easy to forget that something like 2/3 of the units and probably 4/5 of the dollars are in the corporate market. Intel is continuing to do very, very, well. But they've handed AMD an open shot at the high margin business market, and all because they wouldn't pay for a "guard band" in capacity. I doubt Willamette is going to do AMD any damage - remember that Athlon professional will have on chip cache and .10 gate length copper when Willamette ships in Q3. Also keep in mind that, per share, AMD made 2/3s the profits of Intel when AMD's ASPs were in the $80s and Intel's ASPs were around $200 and AMD had half its large FABs sitting idle while all of Intel's FABs were running flat out. It's going to be a great year for both companies - but (Paul, are you listening?) AMD has more upside potential. <VBG> Dan