[Digitimes] Kaveri delayed

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Vesku

Vesku

Diamond Member
Aug 25, 2005
3,743
28
86
SiliconWars said:
Intel doesn't need to get involved, any one of the ARM guys would do. Qualcomm was long rumoured to be interested, no way could AMD compete with them and there would be no antitrust issues either. AMD would simply have cut their own throats by not guaranteeing capacity for a set number of years until they were better positioned to determine what direction their chipmaking took.

It was almost certainly AMD who asked for 15 years to do so.
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As part of AMD going fabless they would need fab portable designs in a lot less than 15 years. There was pretty much zero risk of AMD/GF 45 or 32nm being swarmed by other fabless customers as they aren't offering advantages from UMC and TSMC. There was low risk for 28nm as even the original unstalled timeline would have it competing with TSMC.
 
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SiliconWars

Platinum Member
Dec 29, 2012
2,346
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You don't take gambles with your multi-billion dollar business Vesku, and you have to remember that nobody expected PC's to fall away so badly in such a short time-frame - AMD wouldn't even have been considering a total change away from high performance CPU's to low power CPU's back then.

We don't actually know how stalled GF's 28nm is. Rockchip had the RK 3188 in tablets in March - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVSLXSWf4TA so it was almost certainly in volume production in late 2012 at the latest. Just because AMD isn't using it doesn't mean it hasn't been available.

Oh yeah btw that does mean that GF had 28nm in actual products before AMD had Jaguar even ready for review. That should make everybody wonder why AMD went with TSMC?
 
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frozentundra123456

frozentundra123456

Lifer
Aug 11, 2008
10,451
642
126
SiliconWars said:
While totally irrelevant to the topic, I'll just tell you to look harder because you can buy GF's 28nm chips in tablets right now.
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You are the one who brought up 20 nm saying it will be the magic bullet that justifies the GF deal. As for 28 nm, OK, for kabini I guess, and maybe some ARM chips (??). Havent seen Steamroller or Kaveri yet though on 28 nm.
 
frozentundra123456

frozentundra123456

Lifer
Aug 11, 2008
10,451
642
126
SiliconWars said:
You don't take gambles with your multi-billion dollar business Vesku, and you have to remember that nobody expected PC's to fall away so badly in such a short time-frame - AMD wouldn't even have been considering a total change away from high performance CPU's to low power CPU's back then.

We don't actually know how stalled GF's 28nm is. Rockchip had the RK 3188 in tablets in March - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EVSLXSWf4TA so it was almost certainly in volume production in late 2012 at the latest. Just because AMD isn't using it doesn't mean it hasn't been available.
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You think paying 5.5 billion for ATI wasnt a gamble?
 
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Idontcare

Elite Member
Oct 10, 1999
21,110
64
91
SiliconWars said:
Who else in the market spun off their fabs? How long will Intel be tied to their fabs, paying underutilisation charges? What's the difference?
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SiliconWars said:
Nobody else in the industry has spun off their fabs, therefore you can't compare anyone else's circumstances with AMD's.
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:confused:

How can you NOT be aware of the fact that multiple IDM's have spun of their fabs over the years?

Freescale (fabs spun off from Motorola)

NXP (fabs spun off from Philips)

Infineon (fabs spun off from Seimens)

Qimonda (memory fabs spun off from Infineon, leaving logic fabs at Infineon)

Spansion (spun off from AMD...without being contractually obligated to purchase all future flash from Spansion ;))

Lucent (fabs spun off from AT&T)

And those are just the big-name spin-offs, not counting the number of companies that have gone fabless or fab-lite by simply selling their fabs outright to an existing IDM or foundry without becoming enslaved to their foundry for a decade plus. (TI selling all of its memory fabs to Micron for example, without contractual obligation to buy all future memory from Micron)

The difference between AMD spinning off GloFo versus the other companies above is that AMD was forced to negotiate from a position of extreme financial weakness owing to the disastrously wasteful acquisition of ATI.

Once the ATI deal imploded in terms of value and profits, AMD truly had no choice but to sell the fabs and this meant they had to sell them on the buyers terms under the least favorable (to AMD and AMD's shareholders) circumstances.

Had AMD the vision and foresight of knowing they needed to spin-off their fabs then they would not have waited for their merger with ATI to start the process. Instead they gambled big and went for broke, and broke is pretty much what it got them.
 
AnandThenMan

AnandThenMan

Diamond Member
Nov 11, 2004
3,991
627
126
Idontcare said:
The difference between AMD spinning off GloFo versus the other companies above is that AMD was forced to negotiate from a position of extreme financial weakness owing to the disastrously wasteful acquisition of ATI.
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ATI is the main reason AMD is even around today. But I have come to expect extreme negativity from you regarding anything AMD, unfortunately.
 
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SiliconWars

Platinum Member
Dec 29, 2012
2,346
0
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Idontcare said:
:confused:

How can you NOT be aware of the fact that multiple IDM's have spun of their fabs over the years?

Freescale (fabs spun off from Motorola)

NXP (fabs spun off from Philips)

Infineon (fabs spun off from Seimens)

Qimonda (memory fabs spun off from Infineon, leaving logic fabs at Infineon)

Spansion (spun off from AMD...without being contractually obligated to purchase all future flash from Spansion ;))

Lucent (fabs spun off from AT&T)
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Sorry let me clarify - I'm talking about spinning off their fabs while having the intention of still using them as a customer. Most of these started as a division of their parent company or spun off to create something totally separate. AMD spun off GF with the intention of using them as their main fab partner.

I believe AMD signed a deal with Fujitsu that disallowed them from competing in the flash market after the creation of Spansion btw, so that's an example of the kind of agreements that are made. No idea about the others.

And those are just the big-name spin-offs, not counting the number of companies that have gone fabless or fab-lite by simply selling their fabs outright to an existing IDM or foundry without becoming enslaved to their foundry for a decade plus.
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Most of them probably collapsed or something, eg PRoMOS.

The difference between AMD spinning off GloFo versus the other companies above is that AMD was forced to negotiate from a position of extreme financial weakness owing to the disastrously wasteful acquisition of ATI.
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No the difference was AMD created an entity that it *wanted* and *needed* to be tied to after it's creation. How many of the others can you say that about?

Once the ATI deal imploded in terms of value and profits, AMD truly had no choice but to sell the fabs and this meant they had to sell them on the buyers terms under the least favorable (to AMD and AMD's shareholders) circumstances.
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Nonsense, AMD would never have been able to go below 32nm on their own. It's doubtful that they'd have been able to complete 32nm on their own. Plenty of bigger guys fell by the wayside at 32nm or simply won't go any further because of the costs involved.

Had AMD the vision and foresight of knowing they needed to spin-off their fabs then they would not have waited for their merger with ATI to start the process. Instead they gambled big and went for broke, and broke is pretty much what it got them.
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Probably the only company in the world that had the desire and money to move AMD's fabs forward (ATIC) was created in 2008 - http://www.atic.ae/vision/road-map/ GF was formed in early 2009. There's your vision and foresight.
 
A

Arzachel

Senior member
Apr 7, 2011
903
76
91
AnandThenMan said:
ATI is the main reason AMD is even around today. But I have come to expect extreme negativity from you regarding anything AMD, unfortunately.
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Ironically, ATI is the main reason that ATI is the main reason AMD is still relevant with most everything else also being atributable to our favorite kleptomaniacal CEO. Think about where AMD would be now, if they hadn't pulled funding from Phenom and 65nm, if they had been competitive with Core and Nehalem, if they had spun off GF not because they had to but because it was the smart thing to do, if they had purchased ATI a year later for a third of the price they paid, likely even less.

It's hard not to be extremely negative, because they could've done so much better if not for the horrible mismanadgement in the name of fat bonuses.
 
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SiliconWars

Platinum Member
Dec 29, 2012
2,346
0
0
Tbh I think we're not discussing the really relevant point here. Why is Jaguar being fabbed at TSMC when GF has been fabbing 28nm since the end of last year? Did AMD just not trust GF to get it ready in time, or what's gone on there?

If that is the case then you have to say it's yet more vindication for GF. AMD could have been using those wafers they didn't take on Jaguar at the tail end of last year, saving them a near ~$1 billion fortune. Remember it wasn't just the "take or pay" penalty, they also paid ~$400 million to allow them to fab 28nm APU's at TSMC.
 
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ShintaiDK

ShintaiDK

Lifer
Apr 22, 2012
20,378
146
106
GloFo is the joke of the industry. The only 28nm parts they can make is very low power. Jaguar is not fitted for that.

And AMD being tied to GloFo till 2024 will make sure that AMD will suffer, if not parish due to it. If AMD was to have any chance, then it would be with TSMC. AMD will have to combat 22nm Haswell/Refresh on desktop and 14nm Broadwell in the mobile/NUC space with its 28nm parts.

But keep paying GloFo to not make products and such. Its simply a mafia deal.

Its hillarious if you turn back time. Then GloFo would be the saviour of AMD and endless oil money would overtake Intel and TSMC in process nodes in no time. Right now GloFo is falling further and further behind. And all they have to show is slides and more slides.
 
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ShintaiDK

ShintaiDK

Lifer
Apr 22, 2012
20,378
146
106
SiliconWars said:
Two chips, granted both are on SLP. The lack of others doesn't mean that they can only do SLP, it means they didn't have customer orders for anything else before now.
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LOL, not having a customer means you cant do it in any meaningfull way.

And that puts them what? 1½-2 years behind TSMC? 3-4 years behind Intel?

Great company that AMD depends on.
 
M

mrmt

Diamond Member
Aug 18, 2012
3,974
0
76
SiliconWars said:
No it was a necessity.
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Just to make things clear here:

- you don't think AMD had any other choice except cash out ATI sharehokders using pie-in-the-sky multiples.

- you don't think that AMD had to negotiate the spin off with the bankruptcy clock ticking (hector ruiz own words) made any difference.

Are these assumptions correct?
 
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SiliconWars

Platinum Member
Dec 29, 2012
2,346
0
0
mrmt said:
Just to make things clear here:

- you don't think AMD had any other choice except cash out ATI sharehokders using pie-in-the-sky multiples.
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I think (know for a fact) that AMD looked at alternatives, including a merger with Nvidia. That didn't work out. Back in 2006, who else was making graphics good enough except ATI?

- you don't think that AMD had to negotiate the spin off with the bankruptcy clock ticking (hector ruiz own words) made any difference.

Are these assumptions correct?
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No I don't, because until ATIC was formed the year before, nobody was looking to start up a new cutting-edge pure-play foundry. AMD needed to create a company that was in it for the long haul, a company that had the necessary capital to pay for future R&D and fabs. All things considered, they did very well because they are still in the game whereas they'd be out of it by now if they had still been paying those 3000 wages and fab R&D since 2009.
 
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SiliconWars

Platinum Member
Dec 29, 2012
2,346
0
0
ShintaiDK said:
And that puts them what? 1½-2 years behind TSMC?
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1 year, however we still don't know if they had the capability before then and just lacked customers.

3-4 years behind Intel?
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Intel never did 28nm.

Great company that AMD depends on.
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You make do with what you have. I'd rather be AMD with guaranteed 60K+ wafers per month than somebody like Nvidia who is at the mercy of TSMC and other companies who can pay more.
 
I

Idontcare

Elite Member
Oct 10, 1999
21,110
64
91
SiliconWars said:
Tbh I think we're not discussing the really relevant point here. Why is Jaguar being fabbed at TSMC when GF has been fabbing 28nm since the end of last year? Did AMD just not trust GF to get it ready in time, or what's gone on there?
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Wichita and Krishna were borked thanks to GloFo's mismanaged 28nm roadmap. No way AMD was going to make the same mistake with Jaguar.

AMD is desperate, not stupid.
 
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SiliconWars

Platinum Member
Dec 29, 2012
2,346
0
0
Idontcare said:
Wichita and Krishna were borked thanks to GloFo's mismanaged 28nm roadmap. No way AMD was going to make the same mistake with Jaguar.

AMD is desperate, not stupid.
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You're probably correct, still GF would have got 28nm out in time for Jaguar had AMD trusted them. But yeah, I said you can't go gambling with your multi-billion dollar business and the same applies here.

Still, that was an expensive lack of faith for AMD, and one that GF was totally justified in making them pay for.
 
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