Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[KeithDust2000]

Klaus, of course he is aware of the "waterfall". The point, however, is this:

Pricing for AMD´s mainstream line, the one that´s relatively cheap to produce, is going down. Athlon64, the line to replace AthlonXP at the top, is much more expensive to produce than the latter (roughly 100% more), and ships in (at least that seems to be the consensus among analysts) dissapointingly low quantities. INTEL, on the other hand, is seen as lowering their cost substantially while selling their lines at historically low prices (I´ve already stated earlier why I think this is a distorted view, but I´m trying to explain analyst reasoning and not give my own assessment, I hope DARBES also understood that).


In short, AMD is seen as increasing their cost substantially while reducing capacity at the same time that INTEL is increasing capacity and lowering cost substantially, and cutting prices as a consequence. The result? See what I mean?

This is the reasoning I´ve seen in most analyst reports (10+)over the last months. It´s oversimplified and misses loads of factors, but this is what the analysts are saying and the street is buying, because it simply makes a lot of sense on the surface. Similar for flash, INTEL is bragging about being first to 90nm (again), saying how they will become No.1 in flash, increase capacity like mad, and bang, they got the analysts.

It´s up to AMD to change that view, if a change is justified.

As for the current sales sweetspot, that´s much harder to determine than it used to be. Just look around a bit, and you´ll see that most models seem to be reasonably well represented (except some oddball numbers like the 2100+ and the 2700+).