Replies to post #14496 on Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD)

[kpf]

wbmw

For example, how do you quantify successful marketing? Is there a specific ROI?

Sure there is. But it is way more than that: The crucial point about it is: Intels business model essentially depends on it.

If Intel cut all marketing efforts to be cost competitive with AMD, what would be the end result?

Nothing less than a broken business model.
That is why Constantine (and others) are right on the spot with their remarks that looking at COGs alone (although correct from an accounting perspective) can be very misleading.

How about anywhere in between?

Maybe possible to a certain, very limited extent. But dangerous. Very, very dangerous: You got to pay people for singing your song.

Business-models like Intels are fragile at exactly this point; that is well known in Santa Clara.

For this reason, expect job- and CapEx-cuts to improve Intels cost-position, not marketing cuts.
K.

[wmbz]

wbmw, from a purely accounting perspective I agree with you but I remember from my college days that the cost of a "widget" is the amount of money it takes to get raw materials into the hands of consumers as finished goods. I believe that without Intel's existing marketing budget a lot of those finished goods would be piling up in warehouses instead of making it to the hands of consumers. I believe if you ask around, marketing is a fixed cost that should be included in the total cost of selling a cpu. Sorry, but it has to be.

C