During the weekend, I read two articles that highlighted Apple’s LCD supply chain build out and started to think of how this would look if Apple were to do the same on the x86 side of the ledger. The two articles, one related to Hitachi and Sony building a new 4” LCD for iphones and a more extensive one on Sharp building a new LCD for the iPAD3… Read More
When AMD announced its cutbacks recently many people were left wondering why they were so deep given the strong financial performance in Q3 and the guidance for an up Q4. It couldn’t have been related to the Thailand floods that could have been at most a one-quarter squeeze expected in Q1. Now it is apparent from reports that AMD’s … Read More
With worldwide annual media tablet shipments forecast changing –growing- almost every quarter, the latest from ABI research calling for shipment to approach 100 million units in 2012 and passing 150 million in 2014, with the same kind of forecast for smartphone passing 400 million units this year (438 million) and approaching… Read More
It is always a treat to listen to the nVidia earnings conference call as Jen Hsun Huang offers his take on the industry as well as a peek at his company’s future plans. Invariably a Wall St. analyst will ask about Windows 8 and Project Denver – the code name for the ARM based processor designed to run Windows 8 with great graphics performance… Read More
When Intel entered the server market in the 1990s with their Pentium Processor and follow on Xeons beginning in 1998, they focused on the simple enterprise applications. At the same time they laid the groundwork for what will turn out to be a multi-decade, long war to wrest control from all mainframes and workstations. The announcements… Read More
One of the interesting tidbits of information to come from Intel’s October earnings call was that Brazil, a country of nearly 200M people, has moved up to the #3 position in terms of PC unit sales. This was a shock to most people and as usual brushed aside by those not familiar with the happenings of the emerging markets (i.e. the countries… Read More
Back in the 2008 financial Crises, GM was finally brought to its knees and had to face a radical makeover. They asked for a bailout from the government that allowed the unions to swap out lower compensation for equity, something no union would do unless the alternative was to shutter the doors. The bondholders and the shareholders… Read More
It is hard not to be impressed by Intel’s stunning financial performance since the 2008 downturn. They are on track to post revenue of $55B this year or 50% higher than 2008 while nVidia and AMD will be flat to less than 10% better. More significantly, earnings will be 3X that of 2008. More significantly, in the past 12 months they have… Read More
Time to ring the Bell. With the iPhone 4S, Apple has just surpassed the 70% gross margin metric that usually equates to a compute platform becoming an industry standard. IBM’s mainframe achieved it in the 1960s with the 360 series and still is able to crank it out with their Z-series. The combined Intel and Microsoft tandem (Wintel)… Read More
With the introduction of the Kindle Fire, it is now guaranteed that Amazon has the formula down for building the new, high volume mobile platform based on sub $9 processors. In measured fashion, Amazon has moved down Moore’s Law curve from the initial 90nm Freescale processor to what is reported to be TI’s OMAP 4 in order to add the … Read More
