AMD beats earnings estimates thanks to console sales, but APU outlook is bleak

humbug · 27 Jan 2014 at 14:47

Gregster said:
Nvidia's profit margins

AMD's profit margins

nVidia over the last 5 years have an average profit of 5.73% whilst AMD over the last 5 years have -1.27% losses.

nVidia reported profits of 11.27% in Q4 of 2013, whilst AMD had profits in the same Q4 of 5.6%. A profit is good but the analysts are saying AMD are volatile and you can see why when you look at those charts.

Other analyst say what i have been saying for years, by far the largest dependency for Nvidia is retail GPU's, its very unhealthy to be so dependant on one type of product, that also shows in these latest quarter figures, their GPU sales took a hit, as a result the whole company has taken a huge hit in Revenue and profits.

Intel and AMD are far more diverse, they can take a hit in the in this declining industry and in AMD's case still increase Revenue and profits.

Gregster · 27 Jan 2014 at 14:56

humbug said:
Other analyst say what i have been saying for years, by far the largest dependency for Nvidia is retail GPU's, its very unhealthy to be so dependant on one type of product, that also shows in these latest quarter figures, their GPU sales took a hit, as a result the whole company has taken a huge hit in Revenue and profits.

Intel and AMD are far more diverse, they can take a hit in the in this declining industry and in AMD's case still increase Revenue and profits.

nVidia's profits disagree with that

I also don't know how well Tegra does for them but at the last count, it was losing money but with the K1 looking promising, this could change.

PhysicsMan94 · 27 Jan 2014 at 14:56

humbug said:
Other analyst say what i have been saying for years, by far the largest dependency for Nvidia is retail GPU's, its very unhealthy to be so dependant on one type of product, that also shows in these latest quarter figures, their GPU sales took a hit, as a result the whole company has taken a huge hit in Revenue and profits.

Intel and AMD are far more diverse, they can take a hit in the in this declining industry and in AMD's case still increase Revenue and profits.

Nvidia seems to be moving quite rapidly into other industries too, though, it seems - their automotive innovations that they showed at CES 2014 looked good, and their mobile chips look like they could be popular (the Tegra K1 showcase was actually pretty amazing and I'm not even that interested in mobile technologies).

I very much doubt that Nvidia are in trouble, as you seem to be implying, remember that they still have a market capitalisation of 3x AMD's.

Silent_Scone · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:00

Mate, seriously...nobody is saying AMDs outlook is bad. Far from it, but don't brush aside the bad entirely.

You've got Kaveri which nobody has any clue how well it will do. Mantle...also up in the air...

If you were a heavy investor and the first thing you read is a 16% decline directly after Christmas. You'd think, well ...what's the future hold? Is it enough to return a profitability anywhere near the launch of both the XBONE and PS4?

Enthusiast perspective, Mantle etc...all very exciting. From a heavily invested perspective...slightly ropey year on the face of it?

humbug · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:01

Nvidia have been making the same promises on their Tegra Mobile chips for years, past 4 generations, every one of them was a fail, in fact Nvidia's only Big customer dropped them last year.

K1 may do well, but thats a big MAY.

PhysicsMan94 · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:03

humbug said:
Nvidia have been making the same promises on their Tegra Mobile chips for years, past 4 generations, every one of them was a fail, in fact Nvidia's only Big customer dropped them last year.

K1 may do well, but thats a big MAY.

Fine, let's just say what you want to hear and be done with it:

Nvidia are going down the pan, they are going to file for bankruptcy within a matter of years; whilst AMD are run by gods who never make a single mistake and thus will raise their company's value to above Apple's and Google's within a few months time.

:rolleyes:

humbug · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:08

MjFrosty said:
Mate, seriously...nobody is saying AMDs outlook is bad. Far from it, but don't brush aside the bad.

You've got Kaveri which nobody has any clue how well it will do. Mantle...also up in the air...

If you were a heavy investor and the first thing you read is a 16% decline directly after Christmas. You'd think, well ...what's the future hold? Is it enough to return a profitability anywhere near the launch of both the XBONE and PS4?

Enthusiast perspective, Mantle etc...all very exciting. From a heavily invested perspective...slightly ropey year on the face of it?

The PC industry will only get worse, it will be a niche market by 2015, not helped by fighting among those big 3 trying to lock eachother out pushing up prices and brand feature dependencies. unless the big 3 can sort themselves out in working together to keep the PC industry alive all of them will be living off their stashed cash sooner than you think.

This is currently a self destructive industry, not helped by arguing among enthusiasts about whats better, perpetuating brand dependant features that newcomers find complicated and tiresome putting them right off, opting instead for the simplicity of a console.

tommybhoy · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:18

humbug said:
The PC industry will only get worse, it will be a niche market by 2015, not helped by fighting among those big 3 trying to lock eachother out pushing up prices and brand feature dependencies. unless the big 3 can sort themselves out in working together to keep the PC industry alive all of them will be living off their stashed cash sooner than you think.

This is currently a self destructive industry, not helped by arguing among enthusiasts about whats better, perpetuating brand dependant features that newcomers find complicated and tiresome putting them right off, opting instead for the simplicity of a console.

The most sensible post in the thread.

Suarez7 · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:19

They've been locking each other out for years, I'm sure PC gaming grew last year as a whole.

Silent_Scone · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:22

tommybhoy said:
The most sensible post in the thread.

You lot really do stick together lol.

The fact is 2014 is most likely not going to be a great year for AMD. Yes these are hard times and they're not the only ones that will struggle. Goes without saying. But the way you seemingly just brush off financial data of all things is just pointless. What are you trying to prove by claiming otherwise?

Tell it to the professionals, done trying to have conversation without someone instantly piping up with AMD is bettererer'.

Not my words:

If AMD wants to attack the professional market like they say they want to, they are going to have to attack Nvidia directly and take some of their 90% + market share from them. In order to do so, AMD is going to have to really work closely with software developers to make sure their cards run as fast or faster than Nvidia and do it RELIABLY. One of the biggest problems for AMD in the past has been their reliability, which we admittedly haven't had a chance to look at recently. We actually recently reviewed Nvidia's professional graphics solutions and found that their strength was in their speed AND reliability, which many professionals find the most important metrics for a GPU (and GPU driver). I also believe that AMD needs to harness their Mantle API in applications like ones put out by Autodesk and to get AutoCAD, 3ds Max and Maya to be optimized properly for Mantle. By doing so, I believe that AMD could not only have faster solutions for these applications, but also significantly more stable solutions as well. They also need to find their way into accelerator applications like OTOY's Octane renderer, which currently runs exclusively on Nvidia hardware and could result in AMD selling a lot more GPUs than they do now.

Overall, the outlook for AMD in 2014 is fairly opaque because we don't know how well Kaveri will do, because we don't know how far along HSA is coming. AMD needs to harness HSA and Mantle to their maximum potential in order to be able to squeeze out profitability from the full year of 2014. The ended the year with strong sales of FX and APU sales as well as GPU sales, but they clearly need to get more design wins in notebooks and tablets. I think that they know this and are probably working as hard as they can to utilize these tools in order to compete with the likes of Intel and Nvidia who both currently own the lion's share of the markets that AMD is competing in.

remember, it's not a competition between any forum members. It's real life actual state of the market as we currently speak. So take it up with god if you want to argue it. I'm done with the bickering.

humbug · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:23

MjFrosty said:
You lot really do stick together lol.

The fact is 2014 is most likely not going to be a great year for AMD. Yes these are hard times and they're not the only ones that will struggle. Goes without saying. But the way you seemingly just brush off financial data of all things is just pointless. What are you trying to prove by claiming otherwise?

Tell it to the professionals, done trying to have conversation without someone instantly piping up with AMD is bettererer'.

Not my words:

Case in point.

Silent_Scone · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:29

Well then? Why with all the come backs when it's shown to you why it's bleak for a particular company? You wouldn't bother if I did the same with any other company, it's all brand loyalty. Just let it go, AMD doesn't care about you

.

At no point have I tried to say NV are doing MUCH better for themselves, although if you look at quarterly earnings I could easily be a dick there too.

tommybhoy · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:32

MjFrosty said:
You lot really do stick together lol.

It really was the best post-and the only post I commented on, I never commented on anything else, as it's another fight fest.

The ***** slapping is terrible in nearly every thread in here.

humbug · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:37

tommybhoy said:
It really was the best post-and the only post I commented on, I never commented on anything else, as it's another fight fest.

The ***** slapping is terrible in nearly every thread in here.

Ignore him, he has no interest in reasoning, he will have you going round and round in circles all day, he will make time for it, trust me.

Silent_Scone · 27 Jan 2014 at 15:38

tommybhoy said:
It really was the best post-and the only post I commented on, I never commented on anything else, as it's another fight fest.

The ***** slapping is terrible in nearly every thread in here.

Which is why I initially made a joke about not starting a thread about an outlook on AMD's finances in the first place. What you don't expect is for someone to laughably turn a sizable decline from quarter to quarter to GOOD news. I said outright after joking that it is on the up for AMD if you broaden beyond 2014-2015. How does that change the fact in the decline they've lost investors and there isn't anything really happening for them this year? It doesn't! I don't feel I'm being unfair by saying that. So I don't understand the need to try and dispute otherwise: Oh wait, yes I do. Because the two culprits both have shares in AMD. Oh dear.

humbug said:
Ignore him, he has no interest in reasoning, he will have you going round and round in circles all day, he will make time for it, trust me.

FLOL. Back at you

tommybhoy · 27 Jan 2014 at 16:01

^

Why the attempt to draw me into an argument over and over when the only thing I agreed with was humbugs post on general PC decline and forum tit for tat arguments?

I'm not interested in the slightest about AMD/Nvidia/Intel profit/loss as I'm not on the board/employee/don't have shares.

I pay my monies for what gives me the most performance, if one of those companies leaves the table, there are others to pick from, no?

Silent_Scone · 27 Jan 2014 at 16:06

I wasn't drawing you into anything.

Although you did say the most sensible post in the thread was by Humbug, and then went on to say you're personally not one for brand loyalty.

Draw in the blanks

Gregster · 27 Jan 2014 at 16:08

C'mon lads, every thread is getting out of hand now. I love a bit of banter but it is starting to feel nasty. We all are PC enthusiasts I hope and regardless of what is in your machine (red or green), we share a common goal and that is to enjoy gaming.

PhysicsMan94 · 27 Jan 2014 at 16:09

Gregster said:
C'mon lads, every thread is getting out of hand now. I love a bit of banter but it is starting to feel nasty. We all are PC enthusiasts I hope and regardless of what is in your machine (red or green), we share a common goal and that is to enjoy gaming.

And to band together to look down on the dirty console peasants...

Gregster · 27 Jan 2014 at 16:10

PhysicsMan94 said:
And to band together to look down on the dirty console peasants...

That Sir, is a given. I even look down on myself when I am on my PS3