Intel, AMD Team Up To Offer PC Chips -- WSJ
November 07 2017 - 3:02AM
Dow Jones News
By Ted Greenwald
This article is being republished as part of our daily
reproduction of WSJ.com articles that also appeared in the U.S.
print edition of The Wall Street Journal (November 7, 2017).
Intel Corp. and Advanced Micro Devices Inc., archrivals for
decades, are teaming up to thwart a common competitor, Nvidia
Corp.
Intel planned to announce Monday a laptop-computer chip that
combines an Intel processor and an AMD graphics unit, according to
a person familiar with the matter. The chip is intended for laptops
that are thin and lightweight but powerful enough to run high-end
videogames -- attributes that lately have been driving sales in an
otherwise waning market for personal computers.
It will be the competitors' first collaboration since the 1980s,
said analyst Patrick Moorhead of Moor Insights & Strategy, and
reflects complex shifting dynamics in the semiconductor
industry.
For decades, Intel and AMD have scrapped for market share in PC
chips. Intel has been dominant for much of that time, lately
holding a nearly 100% share, according to Mercury Research. But AMD
recently launched chips that represent the first real competition
for Intel in that market for years.
AMD also recently revamped its graphics-chip designs, looking to
take share away from Nvidia, which has nearly 80% of the market for
stand-alone graphics chips by revenue.
Intel competes head-on with Nvidia in driving
artificial-intelligence calculations for large internet companies.
For several quarters, Nvidia's business selling chips to data
centers has been up by triple digits from the previous year,
presumably displacing sales of Intel processors. Intel last year
acquired technology to compete for that business with the purchase
of Nervana Systems, and it expects those chips to start shipping by
the end of the year.
Gaming PCs typically require both Intel processors and high-end
graphics chips from AMD or Nvidia. Intel's new product give it a
shot at some of the revenue that usually goes to those graphics
chips, while generating new sales for AMD and muscling in on
Nvidia's dominance in graphics units.
"Strategically, Intel is more comfortable competing with AMD
than Nvidia, " Mr. Moorhead said. "They feel like they know what to
do to compete," so they can afford to cooperate to some degree.
An AMD spokesman said that laptops built on Intel's new chip
won't compete directly with those based on AMD's coming Ryzen
Mobile, another power-efficient chip that combines general-purpose
processing and graphics. The Intel chip will appeal to serious
gamers, he said. The AMD unit, which the company expects to ship by
the end of the year, is capable of running games, but not
specialized for that purpose.
"We're playing in a complementary market," the spokesman said.
said.
Write to Ted Greenwald at Ted.Greenwald@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
November 07, 2017 02:47 ET (07:47 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2017 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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