NVIDIA's CEO Doesn't See Fab Ownership in Near-Future

Rob Williams

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From our front-page news:
If there's one man with a lot to say, it's NVIDIA's CEO, Jen-Hsun Huang. Taiwan-based DigiTimes had the opportunity to sit down with Jen-Hsun and pick his brain over current NVIDIA issues and to see what he plans to see happen with the company in the future. A lot of what's said has been known for a while, but he does well to reaffirm his stance on certain issues.

When questioned about the mobile GPU debacle, Jen-Hsun gave the same line he's been giving for a while... that the company has been more than adamant in working to get the issue fixed. He mentioned that NVIDIA is willing to pay far more than what the chip is worth to have them replaced, so it's hard to fault the company here. The problem shouldn't have happened in the first place, but at least it appears consumers can get their notebook fixed without issue, or cost.

Also in the interview he's questioned about fabs, and whether or not NVIDIA will ever own one. Jen-Hsuan strongly suggests that they don't need one given their current success, but it doesn't seem he's ruling it out completely. He does assure that TMSC and UMC will remain partners for the next few years at least. The interview covers quite a variety of subjects, so it's worth a read if you want to get caught up with NVIDIA happenings.

jen-hsun_huang_nvidia_041108.jpg

However, I would like to comment on Intel's push to using x86 architecture for GPUs. High-end graphics technology is not something you can achieve by just stepping through the door. Intel's hope of changing the whole GPU industry is not going to be something easily achieved.


Source: DigiTimes
 

Kougar

Techgage Staff
Staff member
Honestly, I can't imagine them having a FAB of their own... it's simply to exorbitantly expensive to have one anymore, it's why the number of FABs shrank from numbering in the several hundred to just a few dozen within the last decade. And I gotta agree, I don't care that they outsource their chips to TSMC and UMC. Frankly both they and TSMC/UMC are better off with the current arrnagement as I think both companies benefit greatly from each other's synergies.

Integration is a nice idea on paper but it translates poorly in the real world... Dell may be great at designing, building, and selling low cost PCs, but that doesn't mean they can efficiently run their own factories... which is why they've closed or selling them after they tried a vertical integration with them.

Nice interview from Digitimes, thanks for the link :)
 
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