A Real Forecast

Although there have been many projections lately that favor Intel, it is my guess that these are based largely on old biases towards Intel. I believe that a more careful look at AMD and Intel shows that AMD's performance and current position are better than Intel's. And, although I believe that Intel hit bottom in the last quarter and will now grow, it seems likely that AMD will grow faster during 2007 and 2008.

For recent performance we can see that AMD clearly hit its stride in the fourth quarter of 2005. This quarter was the best quarter in Intel's entire history. Yet, AMD was able to increase its processor revenue share from 12% to 15% during this same quarter. It is staggering to think that AMD pulled revenue away from Intel while Intel was at its best. However, these gains by AMD left Intel unable to rid itself of its inventory overstock which increased 11% from the previous quarter. In contrast, AMD reduced its own inventory by 58%. Intel began to drop and hit bottom just two quarters later in Q2 06. Intel has been unable to rid itself of its overstock and it has continued to build since Q3 05. Today, AMD's inventories are less than half of what they were in Q3 05 while Intel's are 60% higher.

The best that can be said for Intel is that they've hit bottom and are slowly growing again. However, the frantic scratching in the dirt by some in an attempt to put a positive spin on Intel's numbers is truly amazing. I've seen people suggest that Intel is now doing better than AMD. Unfortunately, statements like this are purely delusional. The reality is that 2006 is a very bad year for Intel. This will be the largest processor revenue drop for Intel since 2001. Short of a miracle (which even Intel does not project) in Q4 06, Intel's total yearly processor revenues for 2006 will be much lower than 2005's and only about equal to what Intel received in 2004. In contrast, AMD's processor revenues for 2006 will be double what they were in 2004. I'm baffled how zero growth in two years versus 100% growth could be equal or ahead for Intel. Clearly, AMD has done very well and Intel has not.

AMD's processor revenues are up 33% from the Q3 05 while Intel's are down 21%. Faced with dismal numbers like these, those who favor Intel have resorted to looking only at this quarter versus last quarter. However, even here there is no place to hide. Intel's processor revenue's increased 8.8% from last quarter. However, AMD's increased 10.1%. The fact that AMD's margin dropped more from Q2 06 to this quarter has been tossed out with glee by those seeking to fabricate a better outlook for Intel. Howevever, the only reason that this is true is because Intel's had already dropped badly during Q2 06. Today, Intel's margin at 49.1% is still below AMD's at 51.4%. I find it amazing that some don't see how noteworthy this is. Intel has been consistently ahead of AMD and usually be several percentage points. Further, the overall drop has been far worse for Intel. Intel's margin dropped from a recent high of 61.8% in Q4 05 while AMD's dropped from a recent high of 58.5% in Q1 06. This is a 21% drop for Intel versus a 12% drop for AMD. None of these numbers favor Intel. Yet, one doesn't have to look very far to find people proclaiming that these are great numbers for Intel and that they show a glowing future. However, there is no reason to believe the phoney outlooks and no reason to look at Intel with rose colored glasses.

AMD has had very strong demand (up 50%) for its mobile chips. Unfortunately for Intel this is not likely to improve. AMD's 65nm mobile chips will be out soon and will have lower power draw which is a good thing for mobile. AMD is also certain to get a boost in mobile chipsets from ATI which takes away the strongest advantage that Intel has enjoyed with its Centrino line. A loss of share in notebooks is something new as this has been the area that Intel has held onto the strongest. Similarly, AMD's very aggressive move into integrated chipsets gives AMD a good boost for both corporate client computers and budget systems. The budget category lines up well with AMD's recent partnership with the two largest computer retailers in China. The client systems are likely to be a good complement to the already increased offerings by HP, Dell, Sun, and IBM in AMD servers.

Intel is pressuring AMD hard in 2-way servers. This is not surprising as Woodcrest has impressive SSE performance and works quite well with dual core and dual socket with the dual bus 5000 chipset. The only bad part is that this chipset uses FBDIMM which already has a limited lifespan. Worse still, this technology will not grow large enough to become profitable while Intel will have to continue support to the many customers who have already bought or are buying these systems. This will be a future drag on Intel although it only a small one. AMD would pull ahead on 2-way systems in Q2 07 except Intel should have a non-FBDIMM chipset available which will remove the disadvantages of the FBDIMM technology. So, AMD should be about equal on 2-way dual core systems which will prevent Intel's gaining back share. However, Intel will fall behind on quad core systems and will not be competitive on 4-way sooner than 2009. This is the case because, without CSI, Intel cannot use an integrated memory controller. Without both of these Intel simply does not have the base architecture to handle dual core 4-way or quad core 2-way or higher nor has Intel suggested upgrading to a quad bus chipset. AMD should continue to make gains in 4-way and should start making gains in 2-way after Q2 07. This does at least give Intel time for a couple of good quarters with 2-way however it is unlikely to make any strong reversals in servers. Worse still, Intel then loses the advantage until sometime in 2009.

The desktop is Intel's strongest position in the near term. Kentsfield will have little effect for Intel since this is a very small market and will be countered at the top end by 4X4. Secondly, Kentsfield will be countered in Q3 07 when AMD releases the native Altair quad core. Judging from the roadmap for Pentium E 1000 and Celeron D 400 chips, the desktop clock speeds will not increase as quickly as some have suggested. AMD should be able to counter these with Rev F and G chips while competing at the high end with dual core versions of K8L. There does not appear to be any advantage for Intel in Q3 07. This would suggest that Intel's sole strategy for pulling back ahead of AMD will be a move to 45nm. However, this move is not likely to be as successful as some have suggested. In 2008, less than half of Intel's FABs will be 45nm while both of AMD's 300mm FABs will be ramping to 45nm. The advantage of APM will finally be felt as this will make extremely rapid transfers between the two FABs possible. Intel on the other hand will still require two months to move a chip or process from one FAB to another; AMD will be able to do this the same day. Two similar FABs should allow AMD even tighter control over costs although AMD's costs will fall steadily through 2007 as FAB 36 continues to ramp. The costs for 65nm on the 300mm FAB 36 are far lower than the costs at 90nm on the 200mm FAB 30. Unfortunately Intel will not see this same reduction in cost as it is already using 300mm FABs and will already have converted most of its capacity to 65nm by year's end. These reductions in cost should pull up AMD's margin even if Intel continues the price war.

I believe that many (including people at Intel itself) still have not come to grips with the reality that Intel can no longer grow its way out of trouble. Further, Intel is facing a competitor who now has two FABs and is using 300mm. In 2002 or even into 2003, Intel's current price drops would have been far more effective. Today, they have merely slowed AMD's growth while hurting Intel more. Eventually, the reality that AMD now has products spread among desktop, server, and mobile as well as second sourcing from Chartered and soon chipsets from ATI will be unavoidable. It will also become clear at some point that AMD's HyperTransport consortium is paying off with a low pricing model along with the Torrenza initiative. Intel's copycat strategy is not likley to have the same benefit and will take two years to not catch up to where AMD is now. The proposed Geneseo and CSI standards are about as fast but still less flexible than the current HT 3.0 standard. It is entirely possible that HT could be at a 4.0 or even 5.0 standard by the time CSI makes it to hardware. AMD has at least two other possibilities to compete with Intel's 45nm in 2008. These include the possibility of using TTRAM or Z-RAM for cache. This is not an option for Intel as it requires SOI. Another possibility is using the GPU as a parallel coprocessor. This could negate any boost in SSE speed. Again, it is unfortunate for Intel that using a GPU for procesing is easier with HT than with using the FSB. And, whatever effort Intel does put into this would be wasted when CSI is released in 2009.

I don't see any great gains for Intel in the fourth quarter. I'm guessing AMD will increase at about the same rate and hold onto its roughly 22% volume share. I expect Intel to grow during 2007 and 2008 but I expect AMD to grow faster and increase share. I would expect Q1 07 to be Intel's high point with servers and Q2 07 to be Intel's high point on the desktop. Overall, I would expect Intel's revenue's in 2007 to match the 2005 revenues. I don't honest see how Intel could realistically take back share from AMD given all of AMD's proejcted advantages with cost, volume, and the partners and customers it has lined up. I expect AMD's margins to rise regardless of Intel's pricing strategy due to AMD's conintued drops in costs. AMD has clearly divested of the most unprofitable sections of the company while Intel has made a less serious effort. Intel may have to revisit the issue of divestment if it cannot get its margins up. I don't see any possible way for Intel to grow at 30% while AMD grows at only 15% during 2007. Intel show grow but AMD should grow faster.

These are comments I made in December 2004.

I've been thinking lately about what is going to happen in the next year. I know that some are desperately hoping and that others are at least suggesting that Intel will make a comeback. But, so far, I can't see it.

The comeback for Intel didn't happen. AMD retained its share during 2005.

It is clear that Intel's dual core strategy is threefold:

1. Release dual core Prescott chips to slow down the erosion of the workstation/low end server market. This won't actually work very well since these chips will be starved for bus bandwidth. Expect Intel to pump up the cache. This strategy would put another company out of business but with all of that spare fab capacity Intel will only take an embarassing margin hit.

This was pretty accurate. Intel released Smithfield and then followed up with Presler. The dies are large and Intel still uses the large cache approach on the Xeon units. These processors have been ineffective against Opteron.

2. Release dual core Dothan based chips to slow down the erosion of the desktop market. Intel is hoping that just one of the benchmarks will favor this chip. This is not a great strategy but it really is all Intel has since, without being able to keep up with Prescott, Intel's only other choice is to fall farther and farther behind.

Yonah based on Dothan was next. Yonah was also not very impressive on the desktop.

3. Work on something more reasonable for 2006. This is Intel's real strategy although they won't actually admit this to their shareholders, employees, or customers. Intel is praying that they can get something out the door in 2006 that will give them a fighting chance.

At the time, no one else was talking about a new design for 2006. The talk was that Intel was going to release something competitive in 2005 which did not happen.

In all honesty, I don't think Intel has hit bottom yet nor do I think AMD has hit its full stride. I think things will be better for AMD and worse for Intel in 2005. Maybe in 6 months things will look better for Intel in 2006 but right now not even that looks promising.

Since my past comments seemed to have been accurate perhaps my latest ones will be as well. It appears to me that AMD will exit 2006 in the strongest position it has ever been against Intel. This should be a good reason for a positive forecast for AMD.