AMD Q1 2015 Earnings - 23 cents a share loss, to exit dense server (SeaMicro)

[imported_ats]

Seattle is still sampling; they're saying 2H 2015 for revenue...wow.

Yeah but why? Seriously, why would you buy a Seattle when you can just get a Xeon-D? Even if Intel charges 5x for Xeon-D, its still likely going to be cheaper in the long run.

 

[Phynaz]

At least you got out on your terms, I was laid off in March. You know things are bad when they cap their severance packages to 26 weeks.

Ouch, sorry man.

 

[Elixer]

We still don't know what direction AMD is heading with the new CEO. She cut Seamicro, even though their fabric tech is impressive, but, we don't know if she really killed it, or if it was on the chopping block long before she stepped into the CEO shoes.

They seem to be betting the farm on Zen (at least a year away?) and ARM based stuff on the CPU side, and on the pure GPU side, their new flagship of 390X (possible launch this summer or fall--Nobody knows what the yields will be with the new memory tech, it might very well be a very expensive card to make.)

They are also fully on board with GlobalFoundries with a $1 billion order.

They still are selling stuff, but they also have lots of holes leaking all over the place.

However, how about AMD hitting $10/share?
http://seekingalpha.com/article/2976736-10-reasons-why-amd-will-be-10-by-2017

 

[JDG1980]

These Q1 results may be disappointing news to AMD stockholders, but they shouldn't be surprising. AMD didn't release any new products of note in that quarter; their CPUs have not been competitive in years, and their GPUs have been hammered by the combination of Maxwell and the big backlog of cheap used cards from the cryptomining bubble.

The rest of this year will be a lean one for AMD. Not much is slated for release; Carrizo and a couple of Pirate Islands GPUs are about it. Kaveri "refresh" barely qualifies as new; it's just rebinning. About the best AMD can hope for is to score a big design win with Carrizo. If they could convince Apple to put it in something, that could bring in much-needed revenue. Apple understands (as many posters on this board do not) that it is bad for OEMs and consumers if Intel or Nvidia have a monopoly, so they have supported AMD by incorporating their GPUs in products like the Mac Pro and Retina iMac.

Zen is going to be the make-or-break moment for AMD. If AMD can pull off IPC matching or exceeding Sandy Bridge, with the higher power efficiency of the 16nm FinFET process, they'll be back in the game. If they fail, they won't get another chance, and Samsung or some other company will be buying the scraps. While AMD is very unlikely to leapfrog Intel entirely, they can still make some very competitive products. A 16nm FinFET APU with four to eight Zen cores at 4 GHz, a GPU on par with Tonga, and 8GB of shared HBM would be a very impressive product - a gaming PC on a chip, something neither Intel nor Nvidia could match on their own. And since consoles seem to be AMD's biggest design win, it makes sense for them to organize their development efforts in that direction.

 

[frozentundra123456]

At least you got out on your terms, I was laid off in March. You know things are bad when they cap their severance packages to 26 weeks.

Really? I am in danger of being laid off and will only get 4 weeks. Of course, that is because I didnt work there that long. You get one week per year of service, but I dont know if there is an upper limit.

Dont mean to sound unsympathetic, I am really sorry you are getting laid off, but many people retail or the restaurant business for instance get nothing. 26 weeks sounds pretty good to me.

 

[frozentundra123456]

These Q1 results may be disappointing news to AMD stockholders, but they shouldn't be surprising. AMD didn't release any new products of note in that quarter; their CPUs have not been competitive in years, and their GPUs have been hammered by the combination of Maxwell and the big backlog of cheap used cards from the cryptomining bubble.

The rest of this year will be a lean one for AMD. Not much is slated for release; Carrizo and a couple of Pirate Islands GPUs are about it. Kaveri "refresh" barely qualifies as new; it's just rebinning. About the best AMD can hope for is to score a big design win with Carrizo. If they could convince Apple to put it in something, that could bring in much-needed revenue. Apple understands (as many posters on this board do not) that it is bad for OEMs and consumers if Intel or Nvidia have a monopoly, so they have supported AMD by incorporating their GPUs in products like the Mac Pro and Retina iMac.

Zen is going to be the make-or-break moment for AMD. If AMD can pull off IPC matching or exceeding Sandy Bridge, with the higher power efficiency of the 16nm FinFET process, they'll be back in the game. If they fail, they won't get another chance, and Samsung or some other company will be buying the scraps. While AMD is very unlikely to leapfrog Intel entirely, they can still make some very competitive products. A 16nm FinFET APU with four to eight Zen cores at 4 GHz, a GPU on par with Tonga, and 8GB of shared HBM would be a very impressive product - a gaming PC on a chip, something neither Intel nor Nvidia could match on their own. And since consoles seem to be AMD's biggest design win, it makes sense for them to organize their development efforts in that direction.

Those are a lot of ifs, and even if they can pull it off, it is a niche market and they will be competing against themselves vs both consoles and dgpus. Really, I think AMDs future depends on keeping the console contracts. As long as they have those, they can probably earn enough to hover around profitability and provide a foundation for a few other niche products and custom design wins. But if the next generation of consoles goes ARM, I think AMD is in dire danger. BTW, I dont think Intel will seriously compete for the next gen consoles, and if nVidia does, I think it will be with ARM.

 

[Ajay]

Just sell the assets to Samsung already.

Only case for x86 is console residuals for Samsung - so Sammy may be able to work a deal to sell all AMD x86 IP to Intel for a few hundred $M - but that revenue stream is a dead end. I can't see the why Samsung would want to sell dGPUs - so that only leaved embedded GFX.

So what is AMD really worth to Samsung, certainly not the ~ $3.3 $B that AMD is currently valued at (don't know if that includes debt or not). I would think that the board - and investors would balk at selling AMD for half that number.

 

[StinkyPinky]

This is grim. I'm not sure why anyone would be happy with this. Losing AMD would mean less CPU options and a pretty dire GPU market.

Would their x86 licence transfer over if they are bought out by a competitor (samsung or nvidia for example...)

 

[jpiniero]

A 16nm FinFET APU with four to eight Zen cores at 4 GHz, a GPU on par with Tonga, and 8GB of shared HBM would be a very impressive product - a gaming PC on a chip, something neither Intel nor Nvidia could match on their own.

I think that's one of AMD's biggest problems - they bet too much on the GPU when the GPU is irrelevant to people who are actually buying PCs. You know what would really save AMD? Coming up with a chip that convinces corporate types to dump Intel.

 

[Zstream]

At least you got out on your terms, I was laid off in March. You know things are bad when they cap their severance packages to 26 weeks.

Is this a joke? Off topic I know but seesh, 26 weeks is awesome. That's like someone working 20-22 years at a company.

 

[frozentundra123456]

I think that's one of AMD's biggest problems - they bet too much on the GPU when the GPU is irrelevant to people who are actually buying PCs. You know what would really save AMD? Coming up with a chip that convinces corporate types to dump Intel.

I have said this all along about APUs. Problem is, they are more than the average user needs and still not good enough for demanding uses, while the cpu performance is mediocre at best. HBM *might* change this, but it is yet to be seen how it will be implemented and what the cost might be. But my take is that all the excitement on these forums about a 300watt monster apu is never the kind of chip that will make AMD relevant again. It is exciting for the small segment of the PC market that games on PC, but if they are to take back a significant part of the market share, they have to scale it down to mobile. I couldnt care less about some hulking 300 watt apu in a desktop. I would still prefer a cpu plus discrete card because it is much easier to upgrade and still will most likely offer better preformance. Now if they could scale this down to a laptop apu with fast cpu performance and good enough gpu for mid level gaming, that would interest me. And no, AMD fans, mobile Kaveri is not there, and not even that close.

 

[jpiniero]

So what is AMD really worth to Samsung, certainly not the ~ $3.3 $B that AMD is currently valued at (don't know if that includes debt or not). I would think that the board - and investors would balk at selling AMD for half that number.

If Samsung was interested in getting serious about the server market (and K12 looked promising) buying AMD's assets would be a way to jumpstart their efforts. They could also use the GPU IP to take the mobile designs in-house and could continue to sell dGPUs if it made sense to help defray the costs. x86 doesn't really factor into this.

AMD shares are basically worth nothing. It's a sunk cost. The longer this drags on, the less likely AMD would be able to completely pay back bond holders between the cash on hand, the console revenue (which doesn't need employees) and whatever they get from SS. That's where the push would come from.

 

[jhu]

So what is AMD really worth to Samsung, certainly not the ~ $3.3 $B that AMD is currently valued at (don't know if that includes debt or not). I would think that the board - and investors would balk at selling AMD for half that number.

That's AMD's current enterprise value (ie stock + debt - cash).

 

[ThatBuzzkiller]

AMD had better hit the jackpot with Zen ...

 

[mrmt]

AMD had better hit the jackpot with Zen ...

I think they will have much more immediate problems to worry about. Intel 14nm will arrive on the market rather sooner than later and that usually means a wrecked balance sheet for AMD. I don't think they will be able to reach their Q215 projections of stable revenues, and Q3 should be even worse.

 

[desprado]

Really if they even launch a good product there past will haunt them with their loss and bad consumer and investor support.

 

[tviceman]

I truly believe this is the beginning of the spiral down. I don't think any new GPU's or CPU's can save them at this point, no matter how great any new product may be. They have made too many cuts, lost too much money, and simply do not have enough resources to ever become competent in all the markets they try to serve right now.

I think before the end of 2015 AMD will file bankruptcy and emerge as a semi-custom vendor only (console chips), or their IP will be divided up and sold entirely.

 

[desprado]

I truly believe this is the beginning of the spiral down. I don't think any new GPU's or CPU's can save them at this point, no matter how great any new product may be. They have made too many cuts, lost too much money, and simply do not have enough resources to ever become competent in all the markets they try to serve right now.

I think before the end of 2015 AMD will file bankruptcy and emerge as a semi-custom vendor only (console chips), or their IP will be divided up and sold entirely.

This..............Some good products cannot save the legacy of a dead company.

 

[Elixer]

I truly believe this is the beginning of the spiral down. I don't think any new GPU's or CPU's can save them at this point, no matter how great any new product may be. They have made too many cuts, lost too much money, and simply do not have enough resources to ever become competent in all the markets they try to serve right now.

I think before the end of 2015 AMD will file bankruptcy and emerge as a semi-custom vendor only (console chips), or their IP will be divided up and sold entirely.

While it is bad, it isn't THAT bad.
If they get a killer GPU before the end of the year, and a killer CPU the year after, they are still very much in the ballgame.
They have some very talented people now, and, as long as those guys remain, they still have a fighting chance.
They could pull another Athlon type comeback.

 

[desprado]

While it is bad, it isn't THAT bad.
If they get a killer GPU before the end of the year, and a killer CPU the year after, they are still very much in the ballgame.
They have some very talented people now, and, as long as those guys remain, they still have a fighting chance.
They could pull another Athlon type comeback.

Lol seriously except lisa there is hard to find any.

Richard Huddy is always crying in his interview about gamewroks.
AMD Roy is the biggest troll in twitter.

If u say these people are intelligent than god help AMD from them self.

 

[Soulkeeper]

Ever since sanders left I've felt the company is nothing more than a play toy for the BODs
They make decisions and put pressure on the management to implement whatever faad or idea that's popular that month regardless of the consequences. If the CEO/employess don't comply they get canned.
The BODs shouldn't be the management and aren't engineers or marketing experts.

Am I far off on this one ?

 

[erunion]

I felt the same way about Read. He did the job they brought him in to do, then they fired him when they realized they'd put AMD on a terrible course.

 

[frozentundra123456]

I think they will have much more immediate problems to worry about. Intel 14nm will arrive on the market rather sooner than later and that usually means a wrecked balance sheet for AMD. I don't think they will be able to reach their Q215 projections of stable revenues, and Q3 should be even worse.

The general softness of the market and "good enough" status of most PCs will have more of an impact on AMD than intel 14nm, at least in this quarter. Maybe later when Skylake and Cherry Trail come out, if they show nice gains, it could negatively impact AMD.
Right now, all we have seen of 14nm is low power products, in which AMD is not really competitive anyway.

 

[Intel FX Master]

Who cares about how much money AMD is making as long as they are moving the industry forward.

 

[tviceman]

While it is bad, it isn't THAT bad.
If they get a killer GPU before the end of the year, and a killer CPU the year after, they are still very much in the ballgame.
They have some very talented people now, and, as long as those guys remain, they still have a fighting chance.
They could pull another Athlon type comeback.

They have consistently held the perf/$ metric in the entire GPU space... What has that done for them? Market share loss. Lots AMD lots of market share loss. All the new products they brought on since Kepler first hit the scene did nothing to stop the bleeding. No amount of game bundles or screw ups by their competitor changed a thing. Why do you think it's going to be any different? Nvidia has so much more pricing headroom than AMD right now that any new product from AMD can easily be matched (or beat) by nvidia's current lineup. Consumers simply do not want to buy AMD GPU's or they would have done so already with the massive price cuts or plethora of game codes AMD has given away.

And you really think AMD is going to have a killer CPU this year? Hahahahhaha ok. It's one thing to be wishful, but another to believe in Unicorns.

AMD as we know it is done as we know it. Too much debt for a take over, no high margin products that sell, and already gutted to the core. There is nothing there that anyone would really want besides IP.