Rumours: nVidia will acquire AMD
Doug Friedman, an analyst with American Technology Research, said that graphics chip maker Nvidia Corp. could well acquire x86 microprocessor maker Advanced Micro Devices in order to “re-architect it”. The acquisition is considered to be useful due to the fact that roadmaps of AMD and Intel Corp. threat Nvidia. The only problem for the graphics giant is that AMD’s x86 license is a non-transferable one. “We believe AMD [could] face mounting pressure from shareholders, to restructure the company with a focus on a change in leadership,” said the analyst.
Indeed, shareholders of AMD are hardly pleased with the company’s performance in the recent quarters as well as issues with the launch of quad-core microprocessors and the release of DirectX 10 graphics processing units. Nevertheless, late last year AMD managed to secure $622 million from Mubadala Development Company, which means that there are those who believe in AMD. But despite of the problems that AMD has had, its roadmap of integration graphics cores into central processing units (CPUs) threats Nvidia: not only AMD increases its market share on the market of graphics adapters, but it transforms graphics solutions into commodity, which may potentially affect Nvidia’s revenues going forward. That wouldn’t be a good acquirement in my eyes by any means as it would basically eliminate the competition of ATI at the market and lead to an increasement of prices.
Source: Xbit-labs
Comments(53)
who cares? AMD failed. Intel is teh winrar.
If the price go up then all I have to say is: ****! It better be darn good then.
ATI + AMD
NVIDIA + INTEL
Is how it should be in my opinion.
AMD failed? LOL, they are far from out of it. Just cause last they had a lower than projected year in 2007, does not mean they are out of the game. Up until 5 years ago they were way behind Intel granted. But, they have never been closer as they are now. There is no way Nvidia is going to buy them out, its even more less likely than the MS/Yahoo deal. If Nvidia had this ability, they would have grabbed ATI long before AMD did.
This rumor was shot down. You should include the info about IBM. Let me find that link for you. http://www.tomshardware.com/2008/02/14/amd_merge_or_not/ There we go. IBM is a much better suited company since the x86 license is transferable to IBM. Not only that, AMD and IBM work closely together when they develop their new tech. Nvidia only has a few billion on hand, where it would take about twelve billion to acquire AMD and its debt. IBM has well over 40 billion ready, in case it ever acquires AMD.
Strange I forgot IBM even existed.
^ What’s an IBM? o_o
…:P
good news imo… just hope nv dont go the way amd did :s
This is terrible!
If Nvidia owns ATI, there is no more competition. Graphics card progress will slow down and prices will go up.
I hope there is some anti monopoly law that will stop this
I guess that anti-monopoly burea won’t allow this. It’s the same case as joinging yahoo+google, impossible won’t be allowed.
AMD/ATI + Nvidia/Ageia PhysX = Multicore CPU/GPU & PhysX AIO
If this pushes thru and
Intel buys nvdia + AMD…
what a monopoly!
IBM sucks, it could worsen the appalling situation of AMD
IBM will STOP nVidia to do that i hope…
IBM is silent partner and is helping AMD to build CPU…
Remember IBMs’ mediocre motherboards phased out by INTEL? LOL
if there is no one competes NVIDIA, like ATI then we are goint to eat sh!t , coz NVIDIA will rule and burn us with thier price as there is no one competes them!
i want to start a new company to develop super vga cards, and i will put a promotion : take 8800 GTX and get 1 8800 Ultra for free and we will give also money , you beloved customer.
LOL IBM SUCKS? You clearly don’t know anything. IBM develops new tech alongside AMD, and they power all the main gaming consoles. AMD+IBM would dwarf Intel.
Think again. We are not talking about gaming consoles here which Intel does not reside.
Maybe a litte company named Microsoft could do something…?
How about Intel+Nvidia+Microsoft, now that would be a competition eliminator.
@17,
same IMB that screwed Apple with their lo-tech PPC for 5 years of emnpty promises? you are funny.
So glad appla eswitched to Intel.
BEN
its you who don’t know anything noob, search it on google to enlighten your little mind on it
LOL
This isn’t anywhere near true.
One journalist found one analyst and created a story.
WE have Trident, Matrox, Cirrus logic… and so on…
Then its not a monopoly!
:S
The x86 license refers to AMD’s rights to ‘clone’ Intel chips, something AMD stopped doing years ago, and was linked to the old concept of foundary rights.
Today, AMD and Intel have cross patent agreements which also allow Intel to use AMD patents in THEIR chips. Intel could not, and would not enter into a patent war with Nvidia, because such a war would leave Intel the massive loser.
So Nvidia is free to purchase AMD, and to continue to produce AMD CPU’s (the tech of which actually came from companies AMD aquired in the past). Nvidia would face other problems, firstly monopoly concerns over aquiring the only other true high-end graphics chip manufacturer. Indeed, apart from eliminating a competitor in the graphics, and motherboard chip market, Nvidia’s only incentive for such a move would be moving into the CPU business, and possibly owning its own chip manufacturing plants (although it is this side of AMD’s business that has proved so very troublesome recently).
At some point, consolidation always takes place in a maturing marketplace, and all the main players know this. The PC world is long due some MASSIVE shake-ups (remember that PC components are currently in price freefall with respect to building machines powerful enough for 95% of consumers). CPU’s are losing their value most quickly, with 40$ chips now good enough for all tasks required by that 95%.
A recent example of Nvidia’s dilemma was their failure to aquire industry physics leader Havok (which went to Intel), having then in a panic having to aquire the very poor second place company Ageia. Intel has declared way on Nvidia (altough, in the past, Intel has tried and failed to expand beyond CPU’s on many occasions). With the bottom dropping out of the market for high priced CPU’s, Nvidia has to treat Intel like a wounded rat, and assume Intel will do whatever it can to fight for a winning chunk of the performance GPU marketplace. If Intel is to take on Nvidia, Nvidia must take on Intel.
If this accquisition happen,we are all screwed.We really need 4-5 competititors or we will be buying graphic card for 3000 $ and procesors for 2500 $ with only 2 brands – Intel and Nvidia
the tides will change and amd will be back on top with nvidia
thats always been the best combination anyway
ati always had bad driver issues
IBM sucks? Have you ever heard of IBM Blue Gene, AKA the fastest supercomputer in the world?
To the omg-we’re-all-gonna-die crowd: don’t be ridiculous. There are multiple antitrust laws (also known as competition laws outside the US) that specifically prohibit companies from mergers and other behaviors that lead to domination and monopolization of the market. Whatever happens, it’s not ever going to be just one brand of a product.
Yea this would be AWFUL! We need competition in the market, and if AMD gets bought out… then nVidia would have a monopoly on the market which would raise prices like you said
Yeah… AMD CPUS + Nvidia prices, would suck horses balls.
anti-trust lawsuits anyone? this will never happen. and if it does, welcome to the $5000 video cards cus there will be no competition.
It’s a rumor. To have 1 major card manufacturer will only give customers a plethora of lackluster cards. Why? No competition. Speeds will not increase and technology will stagnate.
Picture a footrace with 10 contestants all trying to be the lead runner. Now take away 9 runners at the starting line leaving one. Watch as he jogs to the finish line already thinking of his victory speech. Ho-hum.
The sad reality is AMD did screw up big time by purchasing ATI and it was a meal they cannot digest well. They should have instead taken that money and put it to development but instead they got greedy. Now we have a 2nd place processor manufacturer with a video card developer that strives for low to mid level video cards.
If nVidia knew what was good for it, it would stay away from this purchase and innovate. Then again when you have no competition you have no need to look over your shoulder anymore.
If the latter happens then imagine the current nVidia cards on sale now still being offered 5 years later for the same price. Now imagine the card you bought 5 years ago compared to now.
Not a pretty sight.
amd looked at the future, thus they bought ati
wait 2-3 years and you’ll see what amd will do
……….eventually the digital will mix with the analogue through computer science and molecular biology i.e. scientist in Israel made a cpu with dna molecules which is 100,000 times faster than the fastest silicon based cpu….Israel has the highest concentration of engineers in the world and the most scientists per capita than any other developed country!
@13
IBM makes the CPU’s in all 3 big consoles right now. IBM makes better mainframes than you could imagine, IBM has excellent support and servers, IBM handles mostly the business aspects, so your piddly life probably wouldn’t have heard of IBM server them fries for lunch. IBM is an enormous giant, they just don’t waste their time dealing to regular consumers, it wasn’t worth the pains.
IBM is the best suited to hulk over AMD and turn it around, if they did that, they’d have all the CPU’s for all 3 console makers, + ATI has 2 vid cards in the major consoles, so they’d have that as well. They would be dominating the consumer and business market. Poster 13 needs a job.
#9… This is why it is just a rumor. Here’s a deal, IF they go through with it, I will change my nick. Agree?
But, I highly doubt that nVidia will cancel out the competition.
AMD fanboi here!!!
Also an AMD Fanboy, from Austin TX! Go AMD! (Stop making crappy stuff AMD!)
If you read further in to it, nVidia is getting scared, which is also why nVidia stock is dropping, even with them having record profits. Intel / AMD are looking to get rid of video cards, and put all video processing built into the CPU’s again (probably on a sep die on the CPU). This would kill nVidia, which is why they bought the PPU Sector. If somehow nVidia managed by some feat to purchase AMD / ATI, they’d still have Intel as competition, but they’d be more prepared for it, so they can build their GPU onto AMD’s CPU and keep up.
I wouldn’t mind if Nvidia did aquire, I mean AMD is falling behind in everything, There cpu’s and ati is falling behind on videocards, there is so much space in the race to stay #1, amd/ati would have to pull the moon out of there ass to amaze ppl. GO nVidia!!! *I welcome our videocard overloards with 3 thousand dollar videocards
D!
does IBM even care about the consumer market anymore? Just because AMD works with IBM doesn’t mean IBM are silent partners. IBM worked with Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo too.
IBM works with everyone. They license IP and manufacturing equipment/techniques, IBM is services company so they simply don’t care, as long as there is a golden pot at the other end of the deal.
NVidia is not going to buy AMD, they can’t, for one the Anti-monopoly in UE would never let them.
Second it does not make any business sense. AMD is still going over the transition with ATI, the merger process is not yet complete, very bad timing.
Second Intel Buying NVidia is more of a possibility to me, even though Intel is the number one GFX player, they have low end gfx products, the server and workstation products like Quadro and Tesla and other high profit markets is something Intel might get into, also they have the 64 core processor they have to put some IP into that gfx and physics is the most likely application.
The mobile market is going to explode in 2010 so one of these companies is probably going to buy PowerVR – Imagination Technologies…
I seriously doubt NVidia will get into a huge merger, specially with AMD, NVidia’s CEO is a very smart dude.
OK now maybe you should try to research Google because there are little firms that are trying to create graphic cards, like the old S3 graphics but these are in DX10, and even in DX10.1 so you should`t be surprised if there comes new names on the market, for begining 2 of them are for sure, this thing came because of the Balcans fast evolution in IT tech, you can see what Turkey have done with Crysis.
or with Far Cry 
they dont want Graphic card to be cheaper than the public budget so dont fly with your mind try to walk a lit a bit 
and watch news, in my country there are IT news because here in the smallest village we have internet even the cow farms have net 
try to think about the countrys how would they react.
“That wouldn’t be a good acquirement in my eyes by any means as it would basically eliminate the competition of ATI at the market and lead to an increasement of prices.”
Acquirement? Increasement? You sound like a man after my own heart. Commencify the bombification of Iran!
BTW
Nvidia is Fearing from ATI
Radeon Shader RAM RAM-Bus Frequency (MHz) TDP
HD 4870 X2 2x 480 1024MB GDDR5 2x 256bit 1050/1800 250W
HD 4870 480 1024MB GDDR5 256bit 1050/2200 150W
HD 4850 480 512MB GDDR5 256bit 850/1800 120W
HD 4670 240 512MB GDDR4 256bit 1000/1200 100W
HD 4650 240 256MB GDDR4 256bit 800/1000 80W
HD 4470 40 256MB GDDR3 128bit 900/800 50W
HD 4450 40 128MB DDR2 128bit 700/500 30W
Radeon Shaders (SP) FLOPS
per SP Frequency Memory-
frequency
HD 4870 X2 2x 480 2 1050 MHz 2016 GigaFLOPS
HD 4870 480 2 1050 MHz 1008 GigaFLOPS
HD 4850 480 2 850 MHz 816 GigaFLOPS
HD 4670 240 2 1000 MHz 480 GigaFLOPS
HD 4650 240 2 800 MHz 384 GigaFLOPS
HD 3870 320 2 775 MHz 496 GigaFLOPS
WTF!?
I say again WTF!? This leaves me bewildered and confused… I Like nvidia Cards, don’t get me wrong… I prefer them over ATI, but if they’re going to take all of AMD then WTF!? I Love the AMD Processors… They’re cheap, Efficient, and They run everything great… First Yahoo and now this…
I Hope this sh*t stops soon.
Considering how mutch the 3870X2 pwnz the 4870X2 will be completely insane
Nvidia should seriously just drop their 9800GX2 and move on to next gen asap if they want to keep up because ATI are finaly starting to steam again
Cant wait to see who wins the next round xD
As for Nvidia buying AMD, thats been a rumour for a long time but i seriously doubt it…
1. Nvidia said they would never get into CPU manufacturing
2. Nvidia just bought Ageia
3. 1 grafix card maker = loose
Intel has yet to start making and S3 are well, not in the same league..
But agree Nvidia are getting squeesed so cant realy rule anything out.. Intel are making chipsets as good as them now (if not better omglolz) and more and more hate SLI being Nvidia boards only (understandable though but sucks).
Nvidia win end story.
If, I repeat IF this rumor comes true, it looks like we will all be looking to see what INTEL will produce with THEIR standalone video cards by the end of the year.
I know that INTEL has decided to get back into the video market but apart from on-board stuff, I’m not sure how high Intel WANTS to go in the stand alone market, but having to think of them as “the good guys??” would make my brain go boom
If nVidia takes over AMD it will effectively kill all competitors in the processor and graphics arena, leaving only Intel and nVidia, which is catastrophy for all us PC users. Prices will soar and will be like in the early days of personal computing, the sky is the limit. This would be a disaster for all consumers.
why would technology stop.. the whole idea is not only to eliminate competition and increase market share, but R&D new products for other markets, will will eventually filter down to us consumers. It’s not all about money, but information and technology, especially patents. Ever tried to get technical docs and sources from AMD if you are developing for an NVidia card.. ? No, didn’t think so….
No secret the next gen GPUs will also be CPU’s. NV haven’t a chance at acquiring Intel, so the logical step is AMD. Killing ATI would be simply the icing on the cake. It’s obviously much cheaper to buy and existing cpu company and their fab plants than making you own, this idea has been speculated on for some time in reagrds to not IF but WHEN it would happen, and between who.
Unfortunately AMD and ATI had this opportunity, which they royally screwed up with poor communication between the 2 entities along with conflicting leadership.
@4
Quite the opposite. 5 years ago they were closest to Intel. P3’s and P4’s against 2600+ and 3000+ AMD were definitely the go. AMD have been on a downward slope since then.
@who cares? AMD failed. Intel is teh winrar.
nOOb detected.
HI guys
All im going to say is I still believe in AMD
Well if I was to say something about merging then it would be AMD/ATI to merge w/ Nvidia
plus
game’s not over
continuation of AMD FX Series
AMD Phenom FX2 Quad Core series Socket AM2/AM3
:160+ 2.8GHz,2000MHz FSB,10MB L2 Cache,XDR3 Support
:180+ 3.0GHz,2000MHz FSB,12MB L2 Cache,XDR3 Support
:230+ 3.2GHz,2000MHz FSB,12MB L2 Cache,XDR3 Support
:250+ 3.4GHz,2000MHz FSB,14MB L2 Cache,XDR3 Support
:280+ 3.6GHz,2000MHz FSB,14MB L2 Cache,XDR3 Support
:320+ 3.8GHz,2000MHz FSB,16MB L2 Cache,XDR3 Support