Samsung To Allegedly Acquire AMD To Compete With Intel And Qualcomm Head On

[Sony Xperia S]

AMD's x86 license doesn't transfer in a buyout, so who'll make console CPUs ?

One of these agreements involving AMD, Intel and Microsoft in which they all work AGAINST the progress in industry.

Technically, Intel should't be allowed to stay alone doing x86 processors for Microsoft Windows environment, nor nvidia should be allowed to be the only GPU manufacturer.

I voted with YES, and if GOD (and the court if needed) is with us, there will be better times ahead with Samsung creating new x86 and GPU processors with their 14 nm and beyond nodes.

 

[64K]

One of these agreements involving AMD, Intel and Microsoft in which they all work AGAINST the progress in industry.

Technically, Intel should't be allowed to stay alone doing x86 processors for Microsoft Windows environment, nor nvidia should be allowed to be the only GPU manufacturer.

I voted with YES, and if GOD (and the court if needed) is with us, there will be better times ahead with Samsung creating new x86 and GPU processors with their 14 nm and beyond nodes.

No one in their right mind wants to see Intel and Nvidia without some competition. Intel with their ~10% increase in CPU performance with each new CPU generation because they can get away with it and if people think Nvidia is greedy now wait until they are the only game in town.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Or that was the very thing that kept them alive in the long run, because 1) they actually sell that tech now and 2) more funds in R&D would not automagically mean something that was better Bulldozer, or something that would beat the C2D.

The only reason why AMD is still around is because they split off Global Foundries. That gave them a capital infusion but at the same time, it's like sacrificing one arm to save the other. Global Foundries now needs to take a cut of the action which is yet another disadvantage AMD has against Intel. All things being equal, AMD will have a smaller profit margin than Intel because of Global Foundries. It was about the worst move AMD could make but they had no choice. The lenders that AMD borrowed from to buy ATI needed to be paid. You see, ATI hurt not once, but twice. If AMD could sell ATI, they would, but they can't because then they'd owe money in licensing fees to another company just so they can continue to make their APUs. AMD's just digging their grave deeper and deeper.


AMD paid $5.6 billion for ATI in 2006 when AMD was worth about $42 billion (13%). In 2007, AMD wrote off $1.77 billion in "goodwill" most considered to be a correction on the overvaluation of ATI. That brings ATI's value down to $4 billion or less than 10% of AMD's value at the time of acquisition. There's this common misconception that ATI was a huge part of AMD and still really isn't. Reason? NVIDIA. AMD's GPU and CPU divisions are both in second place. AMD could perhaps become a GPU only company but in doing so, it consigns itself to being 10% of what it used to be. That's not something to be proud of.

 

[64K]

I see the term underdog being tossed around forums concerning AMD but I'm not sure if most people really understand how small AMD is compared to 9 years ago. This graph tells the tale. Click on the 10 year button in the graph.

http://www.google.com/finance?chdnp...q=NASDAQ:AMD&ntsp=0&ei=00wUVcm0OoTV8Aa5h4GQDA

Market Cap

AMD 2.06 Billion
Intel 141.8 Billion
Nvidia 11.57 Billion
Samsung 232.19 Billion

It would take very little for Samsung to buy out AMD. Even less to gain a controlling interest in AMD with or without AMDs permission and just run AMD the way they want.

I found this article of interest too

http://www.investopedia.com/stock-a...oblems-facing-advanced-micro-devices-amd.aspx

Intel outspends AMD 10 to 1 on R&D.

AMD has 2 Billion dollars of debt which it's getting very hard to service their debt.

During the second quarter of 2014, Intel generated nearly 95% of PC processor revenue, shipping 84% of all desktop processors and 88% of all laptop processors.

 

[Sony Xperia S]

AMD paid $5.6 billion for ATI in 2006 when AMD was worth about $42 billion (13%).

The AMD case should be put in all management textbooks about the worst case in which an once thriving company transformed itself into something very little and close to bankruptcy.

How is it possible that those same people who achieved successes, then suddenly ruined everything?

 

[R-T-B]

How is it possible that those same people who achieved successes, then suddenly ruined everything?

AMD's been managed by several CEOs and executives over the years. The golden years weren't really managed by the same CEOs as those that oversaw the buyout of ATI, I imagine.

 

[Sony Xperia S]

AMD's been managed by several CEOs and executives over the years. The golden years weren't really managed by the same CEOs as those that oversaw the buyout of ATI, I imagine.

Hmm, but the responsibility should be shared between all employees and connected partners, including the shareholders, the board of directors, the CEO, the engineers, etc.

The CEO himself or herself can't do alone the whole job. And you can't blame them for this.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

AMD 2.06 Billion

Seriously? The whole of AMD is now worth less than half of what ATI was worth in 2007 (give or take 14% for inflation)? ATI would have probably been better off on its own.

How is it possible that those same people who achieved successes, then suddenly ruined everything?

K6 (up to Athlon), K7 (Athlon XP), K8 (Athlon 64) had an excellent run, especially K7 and K8 because Intel was tripping over itself with Pentium 4. Pentium 4 being horrible and Athlon 64 being awesome is the reason why AMD was competitive from about 2003-2006 which, in turn, was when AMD was the biggest it ever was. Ruiz was CEO from 2002-2008 so he was in charge during the boom and the bust. AMD was simply outplayed by Intel and Intel's better position allowed it to not only weather the storm, but come out on top because they could afford to develop two architectures simultaneously as well as advance the fabrication process.

CEO can be squarely blamed for pushing the purchase of ATI. Intel's CEO should also be applauded for seeing Pentium 4 as stagnate and pushing for a replacement. In both scenarios though, it was the engineers that ultimately delivered winning (Athlon 64 and Core 2 Duo) and losing products (Pentium 4 and Phenom).

 

[dorsetknob]

The CEO himself or herself can't do alone the whole job. And you can't blame them for this.

Of course you can

the CEO goes before his Board with "" HIS/HER PLAN or STRATEGY ""
The Board hear his/her plan and then vote to either back or not back said plan/strategy.

If they back the plan/strategy and it fails its the CEO that's going to carry the can (Because he/she got it wrong)

 

[Sony Xperia S]

Seriously?

Seriously you need to change your quote because I didn't type that.

Of course you can

the CEO goes before his Board with "" HIS/HER PLAN or STRATEGY ""
The Board hear his/her plan and then vote to either back or not back said plan/strategy.

If they back the plan/strategy and it fails its the CEO that's going to carry the can (Because he/she got it wrong)

It's all the engineers' responsibility because they didn't deliver a working competitive product. The CEO couldn't do anything about his own employees' intellectual capabilities. The only thing he could do was to try to find some others or to resign...

 

[dorsetknob]

Since when have the engineers been responsible for the Business plans of any Company.
they are employed to Further as best they can the Board and CEO's Business plans

If the Board and CEO's Business plans are crap and they fail to deliver on that Crap then its "" STILL THE FAILINGS of the BOARD and THE CEO ""

 

[Easy Rhino]

Here is why this would be a very good thing for CONSUMERS: AMD has a boardroom full of morons. Samsung has a boardroom full of winners who continually push for innovation. they also have much larger more efficient supply chain in place and a huge pool of money that they can spend on R&D. That means Intel will have to speed up its release cycle giving us faster more efficient procs on the market's timetable rather than its own.

 

[natr0n]

This is Samsung's way to say f**k you to Intel.

I like it.

Only good things can come from this.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Here is why this would be a very good thing for CONSUMERS: AMD has a boardroom full of morons. Samsung has a boardroom full of winners who continually push for innovation. they also have much larger more efficient supply chain in place and a huge pool of money that they can spend on R&D. That means Intel will have to speed up its release cycle giving us faster more efficient procs on the market's timetable rather than its own.

I wouldn't say that. Should Samsung make an offer, it needs to be approved by USA, EU, and Korean trade commissions before it can even go through. Then there would likely be a lawsuit between AMD and Intel over licensing and finally, once Samsung has the x86 license, it would take 2 years to bring AMD's existing microarchitecture to 14nm or upwards of 5 years to design a new microarchitecture. If Samsung announced today, we're looking at 5+ years before consumers see any difference.

The only reason why it would be appealing to Samsung because AMD is dirt cheap. All the legal and regulatory battles will probably end up costing more than AMD itself.

 

[GhostRyder]

The AMD case should be put in all management textbooks about the worst case in which an once thriving company transformed itself into something very little and close to bankruptcy.

How is it possible that those same people who achieved successes, then suddenly ruined everything?

Well its a mix of bad business decisions and underhanded tactics that have ruined them from competing. One thing to note is that OEM's drive the market and right now we have very few OEM's even putting AMD GPU's and CPU into their systems (Of the big dogs I mean). AMD can be part to blame on the GPU part for lack of working on more GPU's for the mobile and focusing hard on APU's and Intel can be blamed for the CPU's. Intel pushed AMD completely out of the OEM market down to mostly HP as the primary seller of laptops and desktops with AMD inside. Hard to sell products when you cannot get them into machines to begin with...

No one in their right mind wants to see Intel and Nvidia without some competition. Intel with their ~10% increase in CPU performance with each new CPU generation because they can get away with it and if people think Nvidia is greedy now wait until they are the only game in town.

Yea, even the extreme fanboys do not want that unless they are nuts (Though I know a few who would probably at first be overjoyed). Sadly enough the only thing keeping prices down is competition. Right now though, the name needs to be more seen among people for them to purchase products with the chips inside otherwise many just buy off a name they see more often.

 

[R-T-B]

There is a fun counter argument FOR the monopoly at the moment:

Rigs last a long time. Seriously. I could still be using my i7 920 comfortably if I wanted and play the latest titles.

 

[Fluffmeister]

There is a fun counter argument FOR the monopoly at the moment:

Rigs last a long time. Seriously. I could still be using my i7 920 comfortably if I wanted and play the latest titles.

Still rocking my i7 920 now, don't feel the need to upgrade it at all. 6 years service+ and still doing me proud!

 

[R-T-B]

Still rocking my i7 920 now, don't feel the need to upgrade it at all. 6 years service+ and still doing me proud!

I upgraded from high end X58 to low end X99 for like $50 because the higher end mobos are going for insane rates. Technically it was an upgrade, but honestly it felt more like a sidegrade. The only real noticeable difference was energy efficiency.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Rigs last a long time. Seriously. I could still be using my i7 920 comfortably if I wanted and play the latest titles.

I blame consoles with their pathetic 512 MiB of RAM. That's rapidly changing now. Only AAA manufacturers try to get every drop of performance out of a platform and AAA manufacturers target consoles before computers programming for the lowest common denominator (Xbox). Titles couldn't be ambitious from a performance standpoint simply because the consoles can't stand it. Now we're getting AAA computer exclusives (like Star Citizen) and Xbox One ports with 16 times the memory of the old generation. Both translate to 64-bit games which translates to >2/>4 GiB of RAM. Take a game designed for 8 GiB of RAM and 720p resolution on Xbox One and bump it up to 4K...you could be sitting at some 30+ GiB of memory usage...like Wolfenstein New World Order cautions.

 

[R-T-B]

I blame consoles with their pathetic 512 MiB of RAM. That's rapidly changing now. Only AAA manufacturers try to get every drop of performance out of a platform and AAA manufacturers target consoles before computers programming for the lowest common denominator (Xbox). Titles couldn't be ambitious from a performance standpoint simply because the consoles can't stand it. Now we're getting AAA computer exclusives (like Star Citizen) and Xbox One ports with 16 times the memory of the old generation. Both translate to 64-bit games which translates to >2/>4 GiB of RAM. Take a game designed for 8 GiB of RAM and 720p resolution on Xbox One and bump it up to 4K...you could be sitting at some 30+ GiB of memory usage...like Wolfenstein New World Order cautions.

Damnit, now you are making me wish I'd gone 32GBs of ram instead of 16... lol

But honestly, the 32-bit barrier being broken is more of a boon than consoles being upgraded.

 

[FordGT90Concept]

Yes, but the reason why it was broken was because consoles got upgraded. Most games you look at that were released between 2005 and 2014 with 64-bit executables, the 64-bit version was woefully under tested. I remember RAGE having tearing problems and Thief having FMV issues. We're now finally starting to see some 64-bit titles that work as well as if not better than 32-bit (2/3s of them are on Unity Engine 4/5 and about 1/3 are on Unreal Engine 3/4).


I'm thinking about X99 and putting 2x8 GiB sticks in it for 16 GiB RAM (upgradeable to 64 GiB). It's easy to add memory, ya know.

 

[R-T-B]

It's easy to add memory, ya know.

Not when I already have populated my mobos 4 DIMM slots.

That won't stop me from just buying 8GB sticks though.

 

[john_]

Samsung doesn't have the same interests or goals as AMD. I don't believe this could happen, but if it happens we will have to forget many things about AMD. IF they keep making CPUs and GPUs for the average Joe, those would probably be more expensive, with more proprietary stuff and no to limited upgreadability.

 

[qubit]

AMD's R&D budget is at its lowest ebb ever, even below NVIDIA. Meanwhile, Intel and NVIDIA are at their highest ever.

This really isn't good, so let's hope the Samsung buyout rumours are true.

EDIT: If someone doesn't buy them, then I can really see AMD going bust in a few years and that would be really bad all round.

http://wccftech.com/amd-budget-lowest-10-years/

 

[rtwjunkie]

Personally I want this to happen. I want a much stronger AMD. I want them to make performance cpu's and gpu's that are released more frequently. This will give everyone an option, force Intel to make REAL advances, and Nvidia to lower prices just a small bit. Maybe then we wouldn't be where we are with 1st gen, 2nd and 3rd gen Core users seeing no reason to upgrade.