Discussing Intel's Meltdown, Pat's Firing, Nvidia, and AMD with Daniel Nenni (Guest Telegrams)
Added 2024-12-06 02:06:02 +0000 UTCThe next episode of Broken Silicon will see us be joined by Daniel Nenni, founder of SemiWiki.com!!! You can ask him about ANYTHING having to do with semiconductors, AMD, Nvidia, Apple, Samsung, Intel, etc - but at a minimum we plan to discuss:
Intel's Financial and Competitive Situation
Pat's Exit from Intel
Who would actually want to buy Intel, and who would be allowed to in the first place?
Nvidia's current (dominant) place in the market
AMD's place in the market (and their future)
Other players like Samsung & Qualcomm
Onshoring manufacturing to the United States
You have ~16 hours to submit! Be respectful, thoughtful, and as concise as possible to have your submissions below considered.
Last time Daniel was on: https://youtu.be/w-49jKCGE5E?si=GuEtWOIhPS1wgTg7
SemiWiki: https://semiwiki.com/
Daniel Nenni's Podcast: https://semiwiki.com/podcast/
Comments
Discounting the possibility of tariffs, is it even economically viable for a company like AMD to release a decent graphics card that sells for under 200$ at launch? What would be the current sweet spot for the die (die size, memory bus, number of CU's, etc)? What's the lowest price they could sell it at if they wanted to be aggressive?
Ronigan
2024-12-08 18:51:04 +0000 UTCDo you think a merger between Intel and AMD could happen? Do you think it could actually work? I think AMD’s products on Intel’s fabs could be an effective combination, though it would take many years. Probably the biggest sticking point would be AMD’s existing agreements with TSMC as AMD will need to continue to make existing parts for many years to come.
Chris Rijk
2024-12-06 20:05:29 +0000 UTCIf you were put in charge of Intel, what would you cut (or sell) and what would you double-down on and why? I would cut (or sell) their datacenter AI accelerators as I think Intel is too far behind and by the time they catch up the market will probably have crashed. I would double-down on x86 in general and try to make it as sustainable as possible, even if that means blatantly copying AMD’s approach.
Chris Rijk
2024-12-06 19:59:04 +0000 UTCLet’s say some of Intel’s old fabs were sold - how would you value them compared to an equivalent fab from another company? My understanding is that Intel’s fabs have historically been something of a walled garden, which would make it harder for a third party to convert them into a productive facility. Does that make Intel’s fabs worth significantly less or do you consider that to be a minor issue? Would you expect the foundry collaboration with UMC to make much of a difference any time soon? https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/newsroom/news/ifs-manufacturing-news-2024.html
Chris Rijk
2024-12-06 19:58:54 +0000 UTCOne argument I see a lot is that Pat just needed more time to cook. Do you think another year would have made much difference? It seems to me that IFS is years away from getting significant outside revenue, with profitability even further away. Even worse, the skill of their design teams seems especially bad right now and requires much more expensive designs to match the competition on performance.
Chris Rijk
2024-12-06 19:58:37 +0000 UTCWhat are your guys’ thoughts on battle mage? Unless it’s in a prebuilt I don’t think it will move that well, people who buy D-GPU’s are in the know and know of other options. If I see a $200 founders b580, I’ll throw them a bone and grab myself a collectors item.
Sad XTX 999
2024-12-06 19:41:25 +0000 UTCDaniel - Given the UMC Intel deal for the Arizona fab earlier this year. Do you know the status? How do you feel about its prospects. Lastly, given the nature of likely over capacity in the 12nm to 20nm fab space, what do you think of the prospects of Intels other fabs?
Kiln God
2024-12-06 19:38:13 +0000 UTCCEOs capable of saving Intel are few and far in between. Who’s out there that you think is capable? I say Rory. He’s done it before to a company that was in worse condition so his track record is there however significant that single datapoint is, it’s there. Would you risk it for a new guy we do t know about or is a buyout the only hope now?
Sad XTX 999
2024-12-06 19:36:32 +0000 UTCHello, Tom and (other) Dan! With potential tariffs looming and a surge in cryptocurrency prices, are we on track for another GPU shortage like in 2017 or 2021? Should we expect severe supply and price pressures for consumer graphics cards in the US within the next 6-12 months?
kjm015
2024-12-06 19:32:57 +0000 UTCPat isn’t the only one that needs to go, I’m sure there’s some board members who are snaking their way around their accountability that led to this.
Sad XTX 999
2024-12-06 19:31:25 +0000 UTCTom and Daniel, Is AMD should do Arm or RISC chip, since there are everywhere? Or could X86 chip take other market than PC?
Nicolas Terroir
2024-12-06 19:31:09 +0000 UTCHello, Is Arm chip a possibility in desktop PC? What we would be the impact for Windows?
Nicolas Terroir
2024-12-06 19:28:14 +0000 UTCWhat is the worst case scenario for Intel's future?
A Ikes
2024-12-06 19:24:02 +0000 UTCWhen will we see (consumer) Intel CPUs made in their own fabs again?
Notso Fast
2024-12-06 16:55:53 +0000 UTCHello Tom and Daniel, hope you two are well. My question is which mistake was the one that hurt Intel the most? The poor Arc sales, the production issues that plagued 13th and 14 Gen, the cancelation of the Royal Core project, or the high cost of Intel Foundries and it's impact on competitive pricing? All had a role to play, but which one hurt the most?
InsanitysReign
2024-12-06 08:23:06 +0000 UTCHello there and hope everyone is well, Pat leaves Intel and we have two new people at the top, but how is that supposed to indicate an actual change for the better at Intel going forward? All I see is the still the previous news of massive layoffs and no change on the engineering side of things that would make me believe better and more competitive products from Intel are forthcoming. I wonder what both of you think about how competitive the next Intel products will be. Cheers.
Manuel Nascimento
2024-12-06 08:11:57 +0000 UTCHi Daniel, what really happened to Arrow Lake. I still can't get over how bad the launch was. Was it cause Intel doesn't have much money anymore? Is there also some big problem in the process? Will they be able to get anything good out of the door in the next 5 years?
QuickJumper
2024-12-06 08:10:32 +0000 UTCHello Daniel. Looking back when was the time for Intel in the past to start restructuring? From my POV the time was right after the first zen launch or at least when zen2 came out.
QuickJumper
2024-12-06 08:08:18 +0000 UTCWith AMD unifying their GPU architectures into UDNA, do you think they will go back to the GCD+MCD approach and have HBM MCDs and GDDR MCDs?
coladict
2024-12-06 07:43:28 +0000 UTCWhat's the current status on AI ASICs of cloud providers (Google, Amazon etc)? What is their purpose and how competitive are they against Blackwell and MI325?
Sakosha
2024-12-06 03:42:27 +0000 UTCHello and welcome back to the podcast! I have a really wild question: ARM- I have had heard rumors and whispers that they are gunning to make and design discrete GPU's. It sounds like they want to hit the gaming market first before going for other markets. Based off reports of them increasing the number of staff for their graphics division, I am suspicous that the fruit of this labor may blossom in the next 3-4 years. I wanted your take on the topic and if you have heard anything relavent?
MelodicWarrior
2024-12-06 02:39:59 +0000 UTCAre we now in the semiconductor oversupply scenario? While market seems well supplied (outside insatiable AI), basically all client and smartphone silicon, and almost all server silicon (GPUs, AMD CPUs) made at TSMC. Meanwhile Samsung closes fabs and Intel is reeling from fab underutilization. This shows clearly that installed wafer production capacity is significantly larger than organic demand for wafers.
KarbinCry
2024-12-06 02:21:44 +0000 UTCCan we stop the pretense and call Samsung what they are - a trailing edge foundry? And, how expensive and dire is Samsung's halting of operations in many fabs?
KarbinCry
2024-12-06 02:19:10 +0000 UTCTSMC's position as the dominant leading-edge foundry appears quite secure. What percent market share are Intel/Samsung fighting over as the 'not-TSMC' provider? Does that number go to zero if they fall too far behind? Any early signs of TSMC complacency?
transpose1195
2024-12-06 02:18:21 +0000 UTCWho do you think would be right choice for Intel CEO? And what do you think of my pick - Thomas Caulfield? Given Intel has so much money in fabs, getting foundry working is the "shortest longshot" IMO - so Caulfield would be a good pick for what he did at GloFo, cementing it as a solid foundry. And Caulfield is also not afraid of cutting projects, trimming fat.
KarbinCry
2024-12-06 02:10:38 +0000 UTC
