News Digitimes: AMD, MediaTek reportedly in talks to form JV

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moinmoin

moinmoin

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"AMD, MediaTek reportedly in talks to form JV: Speculation has been circulating in the chipmaking market that AMD and MediaTek are in talks to form a joint venture that will be dedicated to developing SoC solutions combining Wi-Fi, 5G and high transmission technologies for notebook applications."
digitimes.com

Highlights of the day: AMD, MediaTek reportedly in JV talks

AMD and MediaTek are said to be seeking to form a that will develop notebook applications integrating Wi-Fi, 5G and high-transmission technologies. Other chip vendors in Taiwan are also hoping MediaTek to play a leading role in the local supply chain to compete with Qualcomm in the market. In...
digitimes.com

Personally I consider this an odd one as previously MediaTek seemed to be eager to be close to Nvidia: https://forums.anandtech.com/thread...to-bring-rtx-graphics-to-arm-laptops.2592734/ going as far as supporting Nvidia in its bid to buy Arm. But for AMD being able to combine its own with MediaTek's IPs for a combined SoC would certainly be a game changer (this being limited to "notebook applications" likely means this would be for x86 SoCs, not ARM ones).
 
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moinmoin

moinmoin

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DrMrLordX said:
MediaTek already licensed IP from AMD years ago:

wccftech.com

AMD Radeon Graphics Going Into Mobile Mediatek SOCs

AMD will reportedly license its Radeon graphics IP to Mediatek, one of the largest players in the mobile space. SOC design already underway.
wccftech.com wccftech.com
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Yeah, that is similar to Samsung, expanding an Arm design with AMD IP. This potential JV is most likely something related to x86 as AMD can't license x86 cores, so a JV would be required for that. AMD rebranding MediaTek's MT7921K wifi module as AMD RZ608 could be seen as a first step of eventually incorporating MediaTek IPs right in its Ryzen mobile SoCs.
 
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Thibsie

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Mopetar said:
MediaTek probably just wants someone to acquire them and they don't care who.
Click to expand...

But then, this would raise some eyebrows.
If AMD was to buy Mediatek AND would keep the ARM part of the business...
They also could sell it and keep everything network/modem related but Mediatek, even if it (seen?) as a low end business, isn't exactly a low marketshare ARM SOC vendor.

Interesting thoughts.
 
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insertcarehere

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moinmoin said:
MediaTek is the one major independent chip designer situated on Taiwan and has never been doing better than these days. Where do you get the idea they want to get acquired of all things?
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They are a publicly listed company so technically speaking it's not up to the company's management to decide whether to be acquired or not...
 
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moinmoin

moinmoin

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insertcarehere said:
They are a publicly listed company so technically speaking it's not up to the company's management to decide whether to be acquired or not...
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Sure, that can be said about any publicly listed company in any anything goes discussion. This topic however is specifically about a potential joint venture between AMD and MediaTek.
 
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Mopetar

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moinmoin said:
MediaTek is the one major independent chip designer situated on Taiwan and has never been doing better than these days. Where do you get the idea they want to get acquired of all things?
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Makes them seem more attractive than they probably actually are. What's their long-term prospect? Are they good enough to compete with the likes of Samsung, Qualcomm, or Apple in performance or able to compete on price with the Chinese companies that will make commodity ARM SoCs for cheap?

In a global shortage everyone looks good because even the companies that were last on the list before will get business from customers that would have never considered them before. Once that's all over though what stops them from going back to where they were before? Seems like a good opportunity to cash out.
 
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moinmoin

moinmoin

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Mopetar said:
Makes them seem more attractive than they probably actually are. What's their long-term prospect? Are they good enough to compete with the likes of Samsung, Qualcomm, or Apple in performance or able to compete on price with the Chinese companies that will make commodity ARM SoCs for cheap?

In a global shortage everyone looks good because even the companies that were last on the list before will get business from customers that would have never considered them before. Once that's all over though what stops them from going back to where they were before? Seems like a good opportunity to cash out.
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You still talk like somebody who got no clue what he's actually talking about.

A hint: There are rather few companies that can manufacture 5G modems. There are even fewer companies that currently manufacture and sell SoCs with integrated 5G modems. Those are Qualcomm, Samsung, Huawei, and MediaTek. That's it.
 
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Joe NYC

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Mopetar said:
Makes them seem more attractive than they probably actually are. What's their long-term prospect? Are they good enough to compete with the likes of Samsung, Qualcomm, or Apple in performance or able to compete on price with the Chinese companies that will make commodity ARM SoCs for cheap?

In a global shortage everyone looks good because even the companies that were last on the list before will get business from customers that would have never considered them before. Once that's all over though what stops them from going back to where they were before? Seems like a good opportunity to cash out.
Click to expand...

MediaTek has been growing market share at expense of Qualcomm, Samsung.

I don't know about Chinese companies. MediaTek may also be gaining on Chinese companies because of Entity List situation, and TSMC evicting a lot of Chinese companies...
 
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Mopetar

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moinmoin said:
You still talk like somebody who got no clue what he's actually talking about.

A hint: There are rather few companies that can manufacture 5G modems. There are even fewer companies that currently manufacture and sell SoCs with integrated 5G modems. Those are Qualcomm, Samsung, Huawei, and MediaTek. That's it.
Click to expand...

MediaTek is based out of Taiwan so mainland China will cut them out if they have any companies they can better keep under their thumb.

MediaTek is in the same position as HTC was where they can be the plucky upstart that can grab market share from companies like Samsung by being a less expensive alternative, but as soon as mainland Chinese companies get in on that game they'll get squeezed out.

Is anyone using MediaTek because they're the best choice or because they cost less than alternatives? You can exist in the market space and do well, but only until someone else undercuts you at your own niche.

If no one at MediaTek is looking at HTC which saw a similar upswing before collapsing for the same reason then they're not paying attention. The best time to get out is at the high point and for MediaTek that might be right now.

Perhaps you're making a bad inference that I think they're a bad company or don't make anything that justifies their stock price, but that's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is that they're in a tough spot where their stock price won't look nearly as good. If the directors can get the best return on investor's money buy selling themselves to a larger company then they should look at those options.

Huawei is already putting their own SoCs in their phones and other mainland Chinese manufacturers want to follow suit. No doubt the Chinese government would like more of this done inside China as well. MediaTek should see the writing on the wall.
 
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moinmoin

moinmoin

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Why do you now compare a consumer electronics company with a fabless semiconductor company? The fact that Samsung and Huawei happen to do both doesn't make any comparison of MediaTek to HTC correct.
 
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A///

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This is old news, isn't it? It was brought up last spring/summer. I want to say during the quarter report that saw Intel's stock value tank.
 
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Mopetar

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moinmoin said:
Why do you now compare a consumer electronics company with a fabless semiconductor company? The fact that Samsung and Huawei happen to do both doesn't make any comparison of MediaTek to HTC correct.
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Their situation is similar. They're a Taiwanese company that doesn't have a massive local market and had to ultimately compete against large foreign companies, many of whom get some favoritism from their own countries. Their sales to the Chinese market will dry up quick as soon as Chinese companies have a local and cheaper alternative.

Like HTC their value as a company will decline over the long term. There's just too much stacked against them even if they do have a lot going for them right now. The stock price is up considerably right now and being able to be acquired by or merge with another big company could help them a lot. Doing that while the price is high is even better.
 
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moinmoin

moinmoin

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Like HTC you say...

20210325_114939_0325_sr-2020%E5%85%A8%E5%B9%B4ic%E8%A8%AD%E8%A8%88%E6%8E%92%E5%90%8D.png


Press Center - Revenue of Top 10 IC Design (Fabless) Companies for 2020 Undergoes 26.4% Increase YoY Due to High Demand for Notebooks and Networking Products, Says TrendForce | TrendForce - Market research, price trend of DRAM, NAND Flash, LEDs, TFT-

The emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic in 1H20 seemed at first poised to devastate the IC design industry. However, as WFH and distance education became the norm, TrendForce finds that the demand for notebook computers and networking products also spiked in response, in turn driving...
www.trendforce.com www.trendforce.com
 
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naukkis

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Mopetar

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Pretty big of them to score first N4 design. Question will be how well it stacks up against Apple and Qualcomm designs. Apple doesn't really matter, but with Qualcomm getting more serious this will face some serious competition.
 
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