The AMD Execution Thread [2007 - 2017]

[Pete]

I was going to point to a performance preview at Inq via TR, but it seems that Theo cribbed all those figures from the ppt Vincent linked.

Well, bungled is more like it. How he confused the English graph on p.70 that we've all seen before and that clearly states estimated performance of a simulated 2.6GHz Barcelona against the Xeon 5355 with the still simulated and still English(and apparently even more "confidential" than the rest of this "public" document) Barcelona 2.3GHz vs. Opteron 2222 on the following pages, who knows.

More confusing is that I don't see a 2222 in the appendix that starts on p.84, but given that the Barcelona 2.3 vs. 2222 were the only two charts actually labelled with "NDA" it's possible the 2222 system and results weren't meant to be detailed.

 

[Razor1]

how sure is the 60% OEM deals for the r600 line? Cuase I don't see anything at Dell or HP, and thats a good chunk of it right there. Not to mention Dell just put in the 8300 and that leaves only 1 system with Dell sells with any AMD graphics card and thats a x1300. HP, is using 8300 to 8500 in all their systems now too. Back to school sales are starting soon.

 

[Razor1]

Anyone ? I want to buy some stock before this conference call and nV's share price is skyrocketing lol

 

[Arun]

Anyone ? I want to buy some stock before this conference call and nV's share price is skyrocketing lol

Wait, buy what kind of stock? NV or AMD? I'd stay away from either right now, but that might just be me being overly defensive. wrt AMD, I'm extremely pessimistic about Q2's CPU results, and wrt NV, I don't see enough short-term growth factors for them to be suddenly going up much before the end of the year.

Of course, if you're right and that AMD's design wins for back to school are so minimalist, then that would change everything. But I'm pretty sure that's not the case, so gambling based on that isn't the kind of thing I'd do - but your mileage may vary... However, if that is the case, I ponder whether this is already partially affecting the stock price.

I also ponder what the reaction of good or bad AMD results would be on NV's stock. Hmm. I guess that depends more on units than revenue/income.

 

[kemosabe]

I am giving more weight to external sources outside of both AMD and ATI based upon AMD/ATI's recent delivered products and schedule compared to the internal AMD hype. AMD management has broken it's word for 3 quarters in a row now and ATI is well over 18 months. The Q2 2007 CC is going to be interesting.

Remember when Hector's favorite line at the CC was "We did what we said we were going to do".

Hey Bill, think they'll make any attempt to explain this one at the CC?

 

[nAo]

Jen-Hsun is drawing another line on his board..

 

[pelly]

"Dave Orton quits AMD"

Wow....if that doesn't scare a few investors, I don't know what will.....(if it's actually true)

 

[AlexV]

OTOH, many ppl ascertained that Orton was the reason ATi had been underachieving lately...and he was also skipper during the R600s birth. But I agree, this is like the Red Alert signal for investors.

 

[ZioniX]

(if it's actually true)

It's true. It comes from a press release on AMD's website.

Link

 

[overclocked_enthusiasm]

Orton is ultimately responsible for the debacle that ATI became after his one hit wonder R3xx. I am actually surprised he lasted this long and I suspect his tenure at AMD was guaranteed for a period of time as a condition of the merger. Once this guaranteed tenure time elapsed and he continued with his awful execution they asked for his resignation. Can I prove this? No. Does it make sense? Yes.

Nvidia is trading 10 times higher than it was after the NV30 devacle. After hitting a low of $9 it is now trading at $90 presplit. Nvidia has CRUSHED ATI since NV30 by any measure of success: revenue, gross margins, time to market, earnings and this has clearly been reflected in the share price.

Bottom line is Orton was a terrible CEO.

 

[overclocked_enthusiasm]

Hey Bill, think they'll make any attempt to explain this one at the CC?

Hey bro...nice to see you!! They will spend about 15 seconds on it with glowing praise for his hard work, dedication, blah blah blah. Those that have followed ATI and now ATI/AMD closely know the real reasons.

 

[Razor1]

Wait, buy what kind of stock? NV or AMD? I'd stay away from either right now, but that might just be me being overly defensive. wrt AMD, I'm extremely pessimistic about Q2's CPU results, and wrt NV, I don't see enough short-term growth factors for them to be suddenly going up much before the end of the year.

Of course, if you're right and that AMD's design wins for back to school are so minimalist, then that would change everything. But I'm pretty sure that's not the case, so gambling based on that isn't the kind of thing I'd do - but your mileage may vary... However, if that is the case, I ponder whether this is already partially affecting the stock price.

I also ponder what the reaction of good or bad AMD results would be on NV's stock. Hmm. I guess that depends more on units than revenue/income.

Was thinking about AMD stock, on the CPU end its going to be bad news, that was expected though, so its a gamble but I don't think that will effect the price much. If OEM deals are there for ATi graphics, that might give a nice boost of confidence that everything isn't bad, but looking at Ortan's resignation, things aren't looking good.

nV has a little bit more growth to go, I think it will hit 50 in the next few weeks. but thats about it, I sold it to early :/ at 43, there isn't much information out there why nV's stock is going up other then what we know its healthy, so confidence is good.

 

[vertex_shader]

Orton is ultimately responsible for the debacle that ATI became after his one hit wonder R3xx. I am actually surprised he lasted this long and I suspect his tenure at AMD was guaranteed for a period of time as a condition of the merger. Once this guaranteed tenure time elapsed and he continued with his awful execution they asked for his resignation. Can I prove this? No. Does it make sense? Yes.

Nvidia is trading 10 times higher than it was after the NV30 devacle. After hitting a low of $9 it is now trading at $90 presplit. Nvidia has CRUSHED ATI since NV30 by any measure of success: revenue, gross margins, time to market, earnings and this has clearly been reflected in the share price.

Bottom line is Orton was a terrible CEO.

I agree with you, but not Orton the only who caused this situation, so some more old ATi employee need to follow him.

 

[INKster]

Orton is ultimately responsible for the debacle that ATI became after his one hit wonder R3xx. I am actually surprised he lasted this long and I suspect his tenure at AMD was guaranteed for a period of time as a condition of the merger. Once this guaranteed tenure time elapsed and he continued with his awful execution they asked for his resignation. Can I prove this? No. Does it make sense? Yes.

Nvidia is trading 10 times higher than it was after the NV30 devacle. After hitting a low of $9 it is now trading at $90 presplit. Nvidia has CRUSHED ATI since NV30 by any measure of success: revenue, gross margins, time to market, earnings and this has clearly been reflected in the share price.

Bottom line is Orton was a terrible CEO.

Hey, it's not like Hector is much better. Look at AMD now, competing in the low-end (less profitable) segment of the market for close to a year now...

In fact, i think Dave Orton would have made a much better CEO of the combined AMD/ATI deal, had the board of directors and the main shareholders accepted that hypothesis.

 

[Arun]

The real reasons, you say? Underachieving may be one, certainly, but why must we think it's the only one? AMD as a company is in a state of crisis, both financially and from an engineering perspective. In these kinds of situations, drastic measures have to be taken.

And when that happens, not everyone is going to agree with the overall company direction. It would surprise me greatly if Dave Orton agreed with all of the decisions that will be made with regards to the upcoming restructuring.

In the end, I'm sad to see Dave Orton go, because he did a lot for the industry as a whole. Did he do the best possible job for his company? No. But he made a profound impact on the industry as a whole over his years at SGI, ArtX and ATI.

His greatest mistake of all times, I believe, will have been to sell off the company to AMD. As a CEO, he had a duty not only to strive to grow, but also to strive to minimize risk. While he did a good job overall in the former, he failed beyond words at the latter, both in this instance and in others.

But then again, the exact same could be said about Jen-Hsun in the NV20/NV30 era. The only reason difference is that 3DFX didn't buy NVIDIA back then; it was the other way around. Hopefully the meaning of the previous sentence should be clear enough. And sorry for perhaps being a bit blunt, and not very nice to the persons and companies involved, but you know what they say - the truth hurts. That doesn't mean we should hide it from ourselves...

Once again, I'd like to thank Orton for all he did. And excuse the irony, but I can only hope that the reasons for his departure are not that he felt AMD's restructuring strategy was too risky! While I don't have a lot of respect for Orton's execution as COO and CEO, I will openly admit that compared to Ruiz and Richard, I consider him to be a management and marketing god. And he also had a clear and good vision. I fear everyone else at AMD's management today doesn't have that.

 

[INKster]

Could his departure be somehow related to this ?

 

[Arun]

Could his departure be somehow related to this ?

No, that diagram only lists AMD offices, none of the ATI ones. Both companies had offices in the same locations. That should tell you a lot about how much research Theo did before publishing this, heh.

 

[Maintank]

Hey, it's not like Hector is much better. Look at AMD now, competing in the low-end (less profitable) segment of the market for close to a year now...

In fact, i think Dave Orton would have made a much better CEO of the combined AMD/ATI deal, had the board of directors and the main shareholders accepted that hypothesis.

That is like picking a brown turd over a yellow turd. Orton didnt perform at ATI, he sure wasnt going to perform at AMD. Hector is a completely different matter but the difference is Hector is head of the company that bought Ortons. So Orton is the first out. Hector IMO shouldnt be far behind.

And no, Orton wouldnt have been a much better CEO than Hector.

 

[overclocked_enthusiasm]

I actually think Hector will be gone from AMD soon also. He has ceded some of his power already to Dirk and it appears to be following similar courses of CEO's stepping down that I have seen in the past. Orton would certainly NOT have been the man for the job to run the combined AMD/ATI entity based upon his limited CEO experience and horrible track record as CEO of ATI.

In the end I will remember Dave Orton as a great engineer, good COO and a terrible CEO. While the blame can be spread around to be sure, the bottom line is it happened on his watch. That $5.4 billion price he got AMD to pay for ATI was an amazing achievement in hindsight!

 

[dizietsma]

Once this guaranteed tenure time elapsed and he continued with his awful execution they asked for his resignation. Can I prove this? No. Does it make sense? Yes.

No it does not make sense, unless you can prove AMD put a lot of store by not doing awful executiuons. Any examples ?

K7?
K8?
K10?

All poor on release and needing massive intervention by IBM later.

AMD asking for someones head due to awful execution. Funny.