It's been a long battle for AMD to gain headway in a market Intel has dominated all these years, but now it's taken a turn for the worst (or better, depending on how you look at it).
Not long after a much discussed price increase in its own line of dual and single core CPU's, some now more expensive than Intels own comparable line of CPU's, AMD -maker of x86 microprocessors, said Tuesday it had filed an antitrust lawsuit against Intel Corp., the world’s largest maker of chips, in U.S. federal district court for the district of Delaware accusing Intel of unfair competition, which limited market share growth of AMD.
“Everywhere in the world, customers deserve freedom of choice and the benefits of innovation -- and these are being stolen away in the microprocessor market,” said Hector Ruiz, AMD chairman of the board, president and chief executive officer. “Whether through higher prices from monopoly profits, fewer choices in the marketplace or barriers to innovation – people from Osaka to Frankfurt to Chicago pay the price in cash every day for Intel’s monopoly abuses.”
AMD have also setup a website dubbed "Fair and Equal Competition Home" which also lays out the innovation the company has undertaken in the years its been in business. This looks like its going to be a very public fight and Intel has the monetary power to defend itself. Lets hope us consumers don't lose out.
View: Open Letter from Hector Ruiz (CEO) AMD
View: Full Complaint (PDF) | Fair and Equal Competition Home @ AMD
News source: xBit Labs via Enigma-Penguin posted in Back Page News
Not long after a much discussed price increase in its own line of dual and single core CPU's, some now more expensive than Intels own comparable line of CPU's, AMD -maker of x86 microprocessors, said Tuesday it had filed an antitrust lawsuit against Intel Corp., the world’s largest maker of chips, in U.S. federal district court for the district of Delaware accusing Intel of unfair competition, which limited market share growth of AMD.
“Everywhere in the world, customers deserve freedom of choice and the benefits of innovation -- and these are being stolen away in the microprocessor market,” said Hector Ruiz, AMD chairman of the board, president and chief executive officer. “Whether through higher prices from monopoly profits, fewer choices in the marketplace or barriers to innovation – people from Osaka to Frankfurt to Chicago pay the price in cash every day for Intel’s monopoly abuses.”
AMD have also setup a website dubbed "Fair and Equal Competition Home" which also lays out the innovation the company has undertaken in the years its been in business. This looks like its going to be a very public fight and Intel has the monetary power to defend itself. Lets hope us consumers don't lose out.
View: Open Letter from Hector Ruiz (CEO) AMD View: Full Complaint (PDF) | Fair and Equal Competition Home @ AMD News source: xBit Labs via Enigma-Penguin posted in Back Page News
AMD said Intel’s illegal and unfair actions include the following:
- Intel has forced major customers into exclusive or near-exclusive deals;
- Intel has conditioned rebates, allowances and market development funding on customers’ agreement to severely limit or forego entirely purchases from AMD;
- Intel has established a system of discriminatory, retroactive, first-dollar rebates triggered by purchases at such high levels as to have the practical and intended effect of denying customers the freedom to purchase any significant volume of processors from AMD;
- Intel has threatened retaliation against customers introduc ing AMD computer platforms, particularly in strategic market segments;
- Intel has established and enforced quotas among key retailers effectively requiring them to stock overwhelmingly, if not exclusively, Intel-powered computers, thereby artificially limiting consumer choice;
- It has forced PC makers and technology partners to boycott AMD product launches and promotions;
- Intel has abused its market power by forcing on the industry technical standards and products which have as their central purpose the handicapping of AMD in the marketplace.
I agree with that one.. Not sure about the rest yet.
No-one cares.
You are severly misinformed. Run over to AMD's website and have a look around...particularly under Turion 64 as suggested by Athernar.
And you need to read the comment more closely then. The Turion doesn't cut it when is compared to the Centrino in power usage/ performance ratio.
It's a 64bit mobile processor. Where's Intel's?
First of all, don't confuse "Centrino" with the name of the processor. Centrino is the name of the package of three separate chips designed together for the laptop and wireless support.
The Turion is a 64bit CPU...so comparing a 64bit CPU with a Pentium M, or notebook Celeron is a pointless debate.
and you just need to read period....
It is what company has the better plan for the future.
A better plan will give us the consumer a better product tomorrow and down the road.
Any one of the companies can make a chip super fast today.
But what about tomorrow. This is called scalability.
Why would you want to spend thousands of dollars rebuilding manufacturing plants?
Every month to accept a new totally different technology because it dyed. That would make the end cost tremendous. What you look for is a long term scaleable technology that you can build on. In turn that would drive end cost down.
And from what I have seen Intel has a far better plan than AMD.
And that is why most companies like Dell and Apple go with Intel.
It may be that AMD has a better chip today but what about next year?
Anyone remember the NeXt computers?
Guess who owned it?...Steve Jobs......Guess who bought it when it became a terrible failure....AMD.
the gist of the lawsuit is pretty clear cut given the example of Dell for instance.Suddenly changing it's mind to offer AMD based systems for exclusive Intel machines as soon as BIG DADDY put a little squeeze on them.
NOw it's time to pay.
Cant seeing Intel winning this at all.
I can't comprehend this article, I think it needs some work on the grammar.
Confusing
Doing so, leaves you wide open to law suits...and it should if you can prove that the company in question used those business practices.
just because they dont have a larger market share they have to cry about it and sue intel. its not intels fault they have a larger market share, after all is it not the pc makers and large pc manufacturers decision on what CPU's to use? these complaints between corporations are really getting annoying. first the EU complain against microsoft about having a media player in their OS, now amd complaining about intel not being fair? seems these days if you cant get it your way in the buisness world the only choice is to cry and take whatever legal action you can against your competitor.
I don't think AMD is doing this just to get back at Intel becaus they are "better" at this or that. It is more againts the monoply way of doing that AMD is forced to take this route.
fanboy.
No. That's the point.
Not why they're suing so shut up...
Intel has been known to use unfair tactics to keep their market, like by offering huge discounts to manufacturers for using ONLY intel chips or threataning to not sell them Intel chops at all if they sell AMD ones.
That is quite fair actually. Considering they are giving a huge discount, they must make sure that they actually make up for the losses incurred due to that; and the only way to do so is to make sure they only use their chips. If they gave huge discounts, and only a small amount of chips were bought, Intel would lose out big.
In the processor market, Intel marginalises those who sell AMD based PCs. I don't see why anyone should be angry about AMD wanting to bring balance to the processor market; competition encourages innovation and reductions in price.
First of all I choose to use Intel processors, mainly because of the support they have given and offered me. Intel have spent allot of money to support their resellers, the fact that I don’t sell more than 5 systems a week (I do support also) does not matter to Intel and they are always willing to help me with any sales or technical queries, I don’t receive this from AMD and never have.
AMD have some great products but they need to spend money in training and creating channel partners, something Intel has done and they should get the credit for it. In order for AMD to gain my loyalty they have to be willing to stand behind the product and offer me the support I need.
I think that it is a bit rich that AMD are claiming that they have been hard done by when they spend little to nothing is these areas and are hopping to gain sales simply because they have the best processor on the market.
How would you feel if you started selling AMD chips (for whatever reason) and then Intel decided to "limit" their support to you based solely on the fact that you also sell AMD. Please bear in mind, I'm not saying that they would do that, but this lawsuit is to eliminate practices like that, which Intel does do at a higher level.
LOL they always have!
they should have done this years ago.
just because your an Uber Pc 1337 haxor doesnt mean that everyone is
also with dell you get a help tech desk that is free for ahwile, instaed of having to pay best buy an arm and a leg to get your comp fixed
im not a dell fanboy but i do have one of their laptops b.c unlike your self i cant build a laptop
i do have a few home pc''s two were built, one hp....knock off the dell bashing troll
While I agree that you should build your own PC, some people like a PC pre-made. They like it ready to go, pre-installed, complete with a 3 year warranty. They dont want to have to spend hours building and setting up their PC's, only to have a faulty part that needs to be sent back.
And no, I build all my own PC's. I just think you went a bit over the top with the Dell bashing.
We've got a few dells at work, and i've dealt with them for numerous customers.
EVERY time, they have consistently been quick, easy and reliable in operation.
Anyway going back to the topic i think AMD is doing the correct thing on trying to get things straight and have a clean race
SYSTEM SPECIFIC computers SUCK.(period)
Prices will go up, and they will get greedy just like any other corporate scum.
They are feeling very confident right now, considerung FX-57's price range.
(the FX-57 pricing is a matter of supply and demand, and marketing)
Main stream as in Dell, HP, Compaq.
By making special deals with the big companys to sell limited amounts of there stuff.
Anti-competitive clauses are things like "If you also buy AMD chips, you will no longer get these cheap prices and will have to pay more per intel chip", but written in legalese
Most places have no problems selling both. From what I undertsnad intel is very helpful to system selelrs who sell their products.
I just think this is because amd is upset that intels 64 bit processors are actually cheaper then amds so they are resorting to this.
SORRY. That's NOT the way to do business, OR win customers. I've never been a big AMD fan, although recently they've proven good, but this....... just leaves a sour taste in the mouth.
And I thought Microsoft was legally uptight!
Cut me a break......
AMD is not suing because Intel have cheaper chips or has a larger marketshare.
Insert your favorite company here -> XXX
Insert your most hated monopoly here -> ZZZ
Last edited by 89572 on 28 Jun 2005 - 14:08
when is this bull**** going to stop!?
sounds like AMD are being a bunch of little crybabies... wah wah wah!
Companies using their own cash to sue other companies for whatever reasons to increase competition and balance out the playing field to lower prices for consumers isn't a bad thing. The government has enough trouble trying to encourage competition and at least your tax dollars aren't getting dragged into the messy battle (or not as much as they normally would at least).
Be happy that large corporations sometimes have the power (funds) to hold each other in check because the government will rarely ever step up to the plate and side with what's best for the people.
So let the large corporations duke it out. Honestly, are you that afraid of paying less for a product as a result?
remember, on the pc side, intel used to be the only game in town. then there was amd, cyrix and some others i can't think of off hand. amd proved themselves and gained market-share (maybe still are gaining market share. i don't know), while cyrix went the way of the 8-track tape. (another: remember when netscape ruled and ie sucked? okay, ie's still not great, but a better product wins in a free economy). bottom line: as long as there are no government interventions protecting a company from competition, there can be no monopoly.
by definition, having the dominant market-share does not constitute a monopoly.
Its obvious you havent read the article, do it and then maybe you'll understand why Intel is wrong.
dude what the hell are you talking about. You don't need government intervention in order to define something as a monopoly.
Let me make it simple for you:
1. Intel made good stuff before and gained significant market share (90%) in personal computing. When they were starting up, they had very little obstructions from someone else to take this large chunk of market. There was Apple and them, let's not count Sun/IBM because they always had tendencies for enterprise computing.
2. AMD was the only company that survived out of all you mentioned and with great ideas and technology actually started gaining market share and recognition as having a superior product tailored for the future.
3. Now since Intel has 90% market share they go to all major players (read bigger corporations that depended/provided support for their CPUs on the market and sell them) and tell them "You know what if you start selling AMD we will cut off everything from you". For those companies that's unfortunately unacceptable because majority of their clientel already uses Intel based computers and the switch would be catastrophical. In business world it's the equivalent to real life as someone threatening to kill you.
You can call it anyway you want but that's blackmail and is certainly illegal. That's where Intel has monopoly. The government has nothing to do with that.
Put yourself in AMDs shoes do you think it would be legal if you started a small company that makes snickers that are much more advanced, more comfortable then let's say Nike's. Everyone wants them, but Nike says to all companies that they supplied before, if you start selling shmengie's snickers we will stop supplying you with Nike's. Wouldn't you call that discrimination at least. Who is Nike to say to anyone that they can't sell anything else beside Nike shoes.