I'm pretty sure that their cross-license agreement is extremely meticulously written and every contingency is accounted for.
If AMD went belly-up and closed its doors how would Intel still produce x64 processors? Aren't they licensing it from AMD?
If AMD went belly-up and closed its doors how would Intel still produce x64 processors? Aren't they licensing it from AMD?
I'm pretty sure that their cross-license agreement is extremely meticulously written and every contingency is accounted for.
IP (intellectual property) which includes patents and the licensing rights thereof are legally viewed as being an asset of the company. As such, they are technically the property of the creditors which own the company in the event of bankruptcy, regardless prior legal agreements involving the liscencing of that IP.
If AMD went bankrupt, whoever AMD was defaulting in repayment to would then have a legal claim to the IP (and there is a pecking order in terms of who among the creditors gets first dibs).
It would be up to Intel at that point to seek out and re-establish a license for the patents involved in the production of their CPU's.
It could get very dicey for Intel at that point actually because the creditors don't need access to Intel's patents, just their cash. They could hold out for some rather stiff terms of compensation and Intel would have no leverage on the matter because they risk facing an injunction against selling their chips if they refused the terms of renegotiation.
Without question it is in Intel's best financial interest that AMD stay "alive", albeit on the hairy edge of not profitable and not purchaseable. Intel is being a smart monopoly, not like AT&T or RCA, they realize there is some benefit to be had in keeping Kuato alive while eating its lunch.
IP (intellectual property) which includes patents and the licensing rights thereof are legally viewed as being an asset of the company. As such, they are technically the property of the creditors which own the company in the event of bankruptcy, regardless prior legal agreements involving the liscencing of that IP.
If AMD went bankrupt, whoever AMD was defaulting in repayment to would then have a legal claim to the IP (and there is a pecking order in terms of who among the creditors gets first dibs).
It would be up to Intel at that point to seek out and re-establish a license for the patents involved in the production of their CPU's.
It could get very dicey for Intel at that point actually because the creditors don't need access to Intel's patents, just their cash. They could hold out for some rather stiff terms of compensation and Intel would have no leverage on the matter because they risk facing an injunction against selling their chips if they refused the terms of renegotiation.
Without question it is in Intel's best financial interest that AMD stay "alive", albeit on the hairy edge of not profitable and not purchaseable. Intel is being a smart monopoly, not like AT&T or RCA, they realize there is some benefit to be had in keeping Kuato alive while eating its lunch.
Do you think intel's monopoly would survive another round of more compelling products from AMD? i don't. intel was able to keep AMD suppressed with the help of OEM's and motherboard manufacturers during K8's hayday, but that is definitely not the case this go around. intel no longer has the luxury of everyone involved turning a blind eye, as there are a lot of legal bodies around the world making sure that won't happen. unless intel has another way of bribing the industry undetected, AMD is sure to take marketshare; more capacity and fair access to the free market.
even if AMD doesn't have the highest perfroming processors on the market, i have no idea, they will have a much easier time breaking the monopoly. Fusion looks like a very attractive ecosystem for consumers and developers, and if Brazos is any indication, consumers are quite interested in the entire thing.
Assuming AMD went bankrupt, it would in all probability be pre-packaged. AMD's creditors aren't going to want patents - why would a equipment leasing company want .1% of some bizarre patent for example.
If AMD were to be dissolved the patents would be put up for auction - and you can bet Intel would buy every one it felt it needed.
Unfortunately AMD is, and will always be, capacity constrained by their foundry of choice.
No foundry is going to build-out in advance on a new node in anticipation/expectation of AMD delivering a product that could take 80-90% of the market. Not even a doubling of their marketshare would be a reasonable/responsible build-out of node capacity.
This is one of the flexibilities you give up when you go fabless. As an IDM you can make the executive decision to build capacity like mad, provided you have the cash or the creditors, in anticipation of taking the market by storm. Not so if you are having a foundry build your chips for you.
It's not about whether or not they are at full capacity at any given point, but how much marketshare that capacity, constrained or not, will afford them. They could be capacity constrained at 30% or more, so it's kind of irrelevant.
They have two foundries at their disposal, and are currently manufacturing products at both. To think they don't have access to more capacity than they did in 2003-2005 is silly. Both foundries are shrinking nodes, and bringing on new production capabilities, so capacity will rise further.
This is one of the flexibilities you give up when you go fabless. As an IDM you can make the executive decision to build capacity like mad, provided you have the cash or the creditors, in anticipation of taking the market by storm. Not so if you are having a foundry build your chips for you.
That foundry capacity has to reserved months, and sometimes up to a year in advance.
It not like AMD can go to GloFo and say "Ship us 40,000 more chips next month".
Manufacturing is not like ordering from Newegg.
i'm sure AMD thought of that
i'm sure AMD thought of that
There's one in USA coming up in summer, but not at full production until 2012.And how many 32nm fabs is GloFo bringing on-line in June? Compared to how many that Intel needs for servicing their 80% of the market?
There's one in USA coming up in summer, but not at full production until 2012.
I don't think AMD is capacity constrained currently, they sold ~4M Brazos and could have sold more if they had ordered more, not because Glo-Fo couldn't produce enough. Similarly for Bulldozer, especially on the server side, their share is what? 5-6%? Sure they would be capacity constrained to overthrow Intel from the leader place, but that's an unrealistic goal in the near term. Getting to 15-25% would be a more reasonable goal, and I think they have capacity for that.
I stand corrected for TSMC, should've said a fab instead of guessing which of the two it isGloFo doesn't produce Brazos, TSMC does.
I thought that the NY fab is a 22nm fab? I didn't think it would come online for 32nm at all. Maybe I was mistaken.
Please expand upon this.
What contingencies has AMD put in place across the entire supply chain that they could increase their supply in less that say, three months?
Edit: The above is a trick question in a way. So I'll let you answer the same question with a 5 month timeframe.
Bonus points if you can answer why it is a trick question. Feel free to ask your Zoner friends.
Please expand upon this.
What contingencies has AMD put in place across the entire supply chain that they could increase their supply in less that say, three months?
Edit: The above is a trick question in a way. So I'll let you answer the same question with a 5 month timeframe.
Bonus points if you can answer why it is a trick question. Feel free to ask your Zoner friends.
It's a trick question because you can't some FAB tools delivered in that timeframe.