Nvidia - AMD buyout ?

[Leon]

It's nothing but speculation at this point, but interesting nontheless. Nvidia filed to sell 20mill shares of common stock, which will give em additional 1 billion. PR states that they need this for "general expenses and hiring more people", but it's obvious that they will use this money for aquisition related purchases.

Another guess would be hostile bid for ATI (possible but unlikely), or Creative aquisition (with 480 mil cap, they are a good target).

Thoughts?

 

[AGodspeed]

Interesting to say the least. I also noticed over at NVNews that a Reuters story had the following to say:

So it begs the question...nVidia, reportedly, has nearly $1 Billion in cash, sitting in the bank right now. Raising another $1 Billion begins to make you wonder...Is there something else going on? Is nVidia making a move? Speculation over @ Fools ranges from an acquisition of AMD (where Jen-Hsun Huang used to work), to buying SGI outright...

Here's a wild guess for everyone to think about...Micron (the RAM company), Nvidia, and AMD will merge into one company, or at least will share resources so closely with one another that they're basically one company. AMD has had a great relationship with Micron (DDR revenues among other things) and nForce has brought AMD and Nvidia closer together.

Who knows, but that would be cool.

 

[Vegito]

Who do u think makes better chipset ? nvidia or via ?

And do you think nvidia's driver team will be better than via's driver team ?

 

[GTaudiophile]

Hmmm...

nVidia had better be smarter than 3Dfx. We all know where buying STB got them.

Buying ATi would be out of the question as it would seemingly be anti-competitive...would lead to Intel-like videocard prices. AMD? A possibility. SGI? Don't know. I mean, doesn't nVidia already have a good presence in that market through Elsa/Gloria? Creative? That might be nice.

Just have to wonder if it would be a horizontal or vertical acquisition. If you had the desktop PC and console markets nailed, where would you take your strategy next? Focus on the desktop business market? Professional graphics? TV?

 

[rickn]

Big mergers are scary. Look at Time Warner. Ted Turner has come out and flat out said he regrets ever selling his company

Nvidia needs to get in bed with Micron, or another memory manufacturer.

 

[NOX]

<< nForce has brought AMD and Nvidia closer together. >>

That was my exact thoughts as well.

Hmm... what could they want to do with $1Billion, other then buying something? I know when I go to the bank to take out $1,000 bucks, I know I'm going to spend it.

 

[Bovinicus]

The details are too sketchy. I am not going to speculate. All I know is I will be watching this story closely. I am very interested in knowing what NVIDIA wants to use an extra one billion dollars for. This could lead to some very intriguing developments.

 

[AMDPwred]

That would be cool. I'd be buying a nvidia chipset as my next AMD motherboard then. I'm sure their motherboards would rule at that point. Damn, talk about a monopoly, the motherboard, CPU, video card, and somewhat of RAM would all be from one company. Now all they need to do is to buy WD and my whole freakin PC would be from nvidia

 

[GTaudiophile]

While you nvidiots drool at the thought of an nvidia-centric computer industry, do you bother to consider the resulting price increases? nVidia would most likely become like Intel, a company most of you hate. It makes no sense.

 

[Lankin]

They wont buy creative or ati. They said they dont want in the graphics board market, and have said many times they will always only make graphic chips and not boards. I can see them merging with either a memory company or AMD.. $2billion is alot of dough, and it cant all be spent on R&D..

 

[ChrisOh]

you can buy mexico w/ 1 billion... good step for nvidia, an entire country of cheap labor to make PCB's.

 

[riddelrp]

<< you can buy mexico w/ 1 billion... good step for nvidia, an entire country of cheap labor to make PCB's. >>



I like this thought! If some 3 year old has to work a 16 hour day for me to get a $25 top of the line video card, then so be it! </sarcasm>

-Ryan

 

[odog]

what would happen if nVidia bought AMD... you'd have an intel ish company with great graphics....


nVidia the next intel.....

 

[BeauJangles]

<<

<< you can buy mexico w/ 1 billion... good step for nvidia, an entire country of cheap labor to make PCB's. >>



I like this thought! If some 3 year old has to work a 16 hour day for me to get a $25 top of the line video card, then so be it! </sarcasm>

-Ryan >>



You forgot your open sarcasm statement.. ie <sarcasm>

 

[AGodspeed]

what would happen if nVidia bought AMD...

I don't think it's likely that Nvidia will buy AMD, mostly because Nvidia doesn't have the money to do so. AMD is about 4 times bigger than Nvidia (revenue wise), but they could merge under the AMD name. Same with Micron, although Micron is bigger than AMD and Nvidia combined.

 

[KrispyKremer]

I can see Nvidia getting into the mainboard business (like they aren't already). ATI is doing the same thing.
Intel and AMD focus on the cpu. Nvidia and ATI are mainly graphics chips, but want to offer every other chipset on the mobo aside from the cpu.

Smaller, faster, cheaper...
Here's to hoping Nvidia cuts into Creative Labs' market with onboard sound. I see it now - Creative Labs will be the next 3dfx.
Hmmmmm, Matrox maybe?

 

[sandorski]

WARNING The following post is **Confirmed** to be written by one who is Clinically Insane!

Bwuhahahahaha, Nvidia will soon buy out Creative Labs!

At the demise of the sound card/chip maker Aureal, many of Aureal's engineers were divied up between Nvidia and Creative Labs. Behind the scenes these very Aureal engineers have been conspiring their vengeance! Soon Creative Labs will drop their whole line of current sound cards and replace them with the SQ3500 and an Uber secret SQ4500, which the Aureal conspirators have been working on in clandestine brainstorm sessions!!!

AH, sweet sweet revenge!!!!!

 

[Pariah]

Here's a scenario from way out in left field. Maybe they will spend the money the way they told the SEC they would to get this maneuver approved. R&D and personnel hirings are not cheap. MS spends in the billions for their OS developments, they are going to lose that much on XBox before turning a profit. A billion dollars doesn't go nearly as far as some of you think.

 

[RanDum72]

A Nvidia and AMD merger is likely. If Nvidia ever had problems with their chipsets, then AMD (with their tried and proven track record in this area)
can iron things out. The odd guy out will be VIA then. AMD and VIA have very good relationships because the other is primarily a CPU maker
and the other is a chipset maker. Maybe VIA will be forced to improve their Cyrix line of CPU's then.

 

[Mats]

[sarcastic dumb idea] Maybe nVidia is going to use the money to subsidise the price of their video cards[/sarcastic dumb idea]

 

[coolred]

This is very interesting, hopefully we find something out soon. Is it possible that Nvidia just likes what they did with nforce and now they plan to jump full into the motherboard market. So maybe they use the money to start up a new Fab for just thier motherboards.


Truthfully though. I just think the CEO and owner of Nvidia like being able to brag to everyone about having 2 billion dollars in the bank.

One thing that confused me is that the story on yahoo, did not say they already sold the stock, it said they filed for the sale of it. It also stated that it would be in lumps. I would think if they needed the money for a buyout, wouldn;t they want it all at once, not over time. I just don't see any sort of buyout happening, I mean we have heard nothing about it, and why would you raise the funds if there wasn't already a deal nearly complete?

 

[theplanb]

Hmm... if they ever buy other company... it would have to be... a chipset manufacturer like.. SiS or Ali.. because they are getting serious on this part of business...

 

[Rage187]

I think they are going head first into the Soundcard business..


Probally buy Creative..

 

[MulLa]

Rage187 Yer and we will finally be able to see some quality drivers from Creative or a server that doesn't get overloaded when there is a new driver release

 

[BatmanNate]

<< While you nvidiots drool at the thought of an nvidia-centric computer industry, do you bother to consider the resulting price increases? nVidia would most likely become like Intel, a company most of you hate. It makes no sense. >>



LOL And how much did you pay for that Geforce3 when it came out? $600? I think nVidia's surpassed Intel in that respect already. Buying ATI would only fuel the fire, IMHO. I could just see $800 for a consumer level video card...