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The Courts Government AMD Intel News

Intel Replies to AMD Antitrust Lawsuits 170

Posted by Zonk from the let's-get-it-on dept.
pr1000 writes "The New York Times is reporting today that Intel has replied sharply to AMD's lawsuit. This lawsuit sounds like it will be a bruiser." From the article: "The claims are factually incorrect and contradictory...The evidence will show that every failure and setback for which A.M.D. today seeks to blame Intel is actually a direct result of A.M.D.'s own actions or inactions."
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Intel Replies to AMD Antitrust Lawsuits More

Intel Replies to AMD Antitrust Lawsuits

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  • A bruiser? (Score:5, Funny)

    by BlackCobra43 ( 596714 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:30AM (#13463391)
    More like a playground argument.

    "You did it!"
    "No YOU did it!"
    "No YOU did it!"
    repeat ad nauseam

    • Re:A bruiser? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Infonaut ( 96956 ) <infonaut@gmail.com> on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:39AM (#13463462) Homepage Journal
      More like a playground argument.

      Perhaps, but it's a playground argument with big ramifications for both companies (for AMD in particular). They've been at it in the courts for years, but not without some consequences. As the article notes, a settlement in 1995 gave AMD the right to develop chips based on the Intel x86 design.

      What I find interesting is Balto's claim that Intel is taking this suit very seriously and that it could take three or four years to litigate. That's got to be a big distraction in money and effort for both companies.

  • Your PC is too cheap... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by penguinoid ( 724646 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:33AM (#13463415) Homepage Journal
    Intel's formal response came nine weeks after A.M.D. accused Intel of unfair pricing and rebates, and of coercing customers to prevent them from using A.M.D. microprocessors.

    While I rather like AMD, I really can't argue against lower prices. Um, yay intel?

    • Re:Your PC is too cheap... (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Dachannien ( 617929 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:37AM (#13463448)
      I'd rather have access to lower prices that arise from market forces rather than coercion. AMD asserts that Intel only gave the lower prices to companies that agreed not to install AMD chips in their machines.

      With fair competition, prices would remain just as low, and people would be able to choose between an AMD processor or an Intel processor in their crappy new Dell. Lower prices + choice > lower prices.

      • Re:Your PC is too cheap... (Score:5, Informative)

        by DoofusOfDeath ( 636671 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @10:17AM (#13463982)
        The problem with market forces is that, when unchecked, tend to lead to just one company being a monopoly and having pricing freedom, because it actually kills every competitor.

        Here's an example: In the town where I grew up, there was a nice floral shop. Then in came a huge chain supermarket that offered lower prices on cut flowers. After a while, the local mom-and-pop florists died under price pressure. Once they were dead, the supermarket raised its prices on cut flowers.

        So what you get is a temporary price reduction while the big company kills the little one. And perhaps whenever it needs to kill a competitor. But most of the time the prices stay high.
        • Ahh but the world is going to end tomorrow, so we may as well the lowest prices possible today!!! At least thats what most peoples attitude seems to be.
        • So what you get is a temporary price reduction while the big company kills the little one.

          That's exactly what Intel is doing by giving Dell and friends deals if they don't install AMD chips. You get a cheaper price on Intel processors, and when AMD finally goes under because of the anticompetitive practices, Intel jacks the prices on its processors sky high.

        • That's an invalid comparison to the issue at hand. Flowers are a commodity and therefore marginal players have no pricing power since there is no way to differentiate yourself from your competition.

          CPUs are in no way a commodity since there is plenty of room to innovate and differentiate yourself from the competition (AMD-64 anyone)?

          Also, you cannot take microeconomic theories and apply them to macroeconomics wholesale. While some theories hold, others do not. It is dangerous to mix apples and oranges.

          If

    • Re:Your PC is too cheap... (Score:4, Informative)

      by PsychicX ( 866028 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:54AM (#13463555)
      Right, but there are rules about this sort of thing. In Japan, for example, Intel was found guilty of (or admitted to?) giving rebates on Intel processors based on how many AMD processors the OEM was buying. More AMD processors meant the Intel chips cost more. These are precisely the same tactics that MS was sued for, remember, and that slashdotters everywhere bemoan as being the cause of Linux's lack of adoption (whether that is true is a different discussion).
    • While I rather like AMD, I really can't argue against lower prices. Um, yay intel?

      You don't seem to understand how monopolistic pricing works. A typical example is to only offer a rebate if they don't use AMD chips. The post-rebate price is the "take it in the shorts" end user price. The pre-rebate price is the "drive stores carrying AMD out of business" price.

      Let me make an example, let's assuming the marketing at Intel has figured out that 500$ is the optimal price point:

      Fair play:
      Intel chips cost 500$, r
      • The solution in this case is to only carry AMD chips and then explain to customers what Intel is doing and why you're not able to carry their chips.

        (disclaimer: proud owner of two Athlon XPs and no Intels newer than a P2).

  • Reverting to the Microsoft defence... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MosesJones ( 55544 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:34AM (#13463419) Homepage

    MS/Intel: "We did nothing at all to try and impact our competition or operate in anyway unfairly"

    Netscape/AMD: "So what about this memo where you say you are going to do everything to 'kill' us"

    MS/Intel: "You made us do it, its your own fault"

    Its going to be brusing but the key is going to be disclosure.

    • Obligatory Family Guy Quote (Score:2, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward
      El Dorado Executive - Listen Peter, the last thing we want is for kids to start smoking
      Peter - Well, what about that graph that says "The first thing we want is for kids to start smoking" *points to said graph*
      EDE - That? Oh that's just something my son made in art class
      Peter - Oh yeah? Well what about that sign that says "The graph was NOT made in art class. We really DO want kids to start smoking" *points to said sign*
    • Netscape/AMD: "So what about this memo where you say you are going to do everything to 'kill' us"

      Not to put too fine a point on it, but things like that are said in every company about the competition.

      See, it's like how the coach tells you to go an "kill" the other team just before you run out onto the field.

  • What would you expect? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Slime-dogg ( 120473 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:35AM (#13463432) Journal

    Would you really expect Intel to say "Oh, we're sorry that we're monopolists. Please punish us!"

    Who knows. Maybe Intel is right, maybe not. Court will decide.

    • Re:What would you expect? (Score:4, Interesting)

      by penguinoid ( 724646 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:39AM (#13463461) Homepage Journal
      A.M.D.'s lawsuit on June 27 came after the Japanese Fair Trade Commission concluded in March that Intel had stifled competition there by offering rebates to five computer companies, including Toshiba and Sony, in exchange for their agreeing to limit purchases from A.M.D. or Transmeta, another Intel rival.

      Apparently AMD does have a case. Much as I like intel's low prices, that won't last if they become a monopoly. I wonder if apple got an offer of this sort from intel?
      • Much as I like intel's low prices, that won't last if they become a monopoly.

        You like Intel's low prices? Pick any price point; the AMD processor will be faster than the Intel for the same price. Except for maybe the new dual-processor offerings, AMD's prices have always been significantly lower than Intel's.

      • "Much as I like intel's low prices, that won't last if they become a monopoly."

        And that's the huge flaw in AMD's case. Intel isn't manipulating prices because it has a monopoly, but does so because it wants to maintain market share in the face of competitors like AMD, VIA, and formerly Transmeta. With Chinese x86 CPUs bound to appear within the next few years, intel has to keep doing stuff like this to compete. What intel is doing isn't a monopolist abusing its status, it's a market leader fighting to hold

        • I thought the Chinese were making their own "Dragon" chip or something...

          I didn't realize it was just a clone of an x86 chip.
        • What intel is doing isn't a monopolist abusing its status, it's a market leader fighting to hold on to the top spot.

          The same could be said of anybody who uses subterfuge to not only maintain their position, but undermine their competitor's chance of even competing for the same spot. You would be best to think the same of any linebacker who clips a QB at the knees 3 seconds after a pass, a mob boss who rats out his rival to the police, or even a Sergeant who frags his superior to aide in his timely promotion
      • Does that mean that transmeta is entitled to damages as well, or does it just set precedent that they can use to sue as well?

    • Re:What would you expect? (Score:4, Informative)

      by IpalindromeI ( 515070 ) * on Friday September 02, 2005 @10:19AM (#13464003) Journal
      Would you really expect Intel to say "Oh, we're sorry that we're monopolists. Please punish us!"

      Having a monopoly is not a crime. Using that monopoly unfairly to stamp out competition is the crime. Maybe you meant to write: Would you really expect Intel to say "Oh, we've employed anti-competitive business practices. Please punish us!"
      • Having a monopoly is not a crime.

        In theory, maybe. Practically speaking it's always a crime because common business practices are illegal if you're a monopoly.

        • "Practically speaking it's always a crime because common business practices are illegal if you're a monopoly"

          What the hell are you talking about. A mom and pop shop that's the only one in town has a monopoly, but there's nothing illegal about them doing business.

    • Would you really expect Intel to say "Oh, we're sorry that we're monopolists. Please punish us!"

      If they are, they could save themselves a lot of money in lawyers fees and get a lighter punishment by doing just that.

    • who knows, maybe microsoft isn't a slime sucking scumbag monopolist. let the courts decide.

      oh wait...

      japan's FTC kicked intel's ass for being scumbags and south korea is now looking to bring charges against them. i'm certainly glad at least 2 countries have enough courage and cojones to stand up to these bullies and criminals.

  • AMD already has a response, btw... (Score:5, Informative)

    by Kid Zero ( 4866 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:37AM (#13463447) Homepage Journal
    http://www.amd.com/us-en/Corporate/VirtualPressRoo m/0,,51_104_543~100845,00.html [amd.com]

    I still think this is more of a playground argument. Nothing we haven't seen before.
    • Yes, we have seen similar lawsuits before. The results, however, vary wildly.
      On one hand we have things like the SCO vs. IBM ligitation, which seems meritless and might end with SCO destroyed by IBM's counterclaims.
      On the other hand, Microsoft has settled a few similar lawsuits by paying large sums, which indicates they had reason to fear the outcome of the lawsuit.

  • My test (Score:5, Informative)

    by Epistax ( 544591 ) <epistax @ g m a il.com> on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:40AM (#13463467) Journal
    Has Company A ever offered any sort of incentives to Company B to NOT sell or buy products by Company C. (Note: I did not say incentives to buy/sell Company A, I said incentives to NOT buy/sell company C.)

    If this is the case, the company has committed a crime. If this isn't a crime, then what the fuck is?
    • "Has Company A ever offered any sort of incentives to Company B to NOT sell or buy products by Company C. ...If this is the case, the company has committed a crime. If this isn't a crime, then what the fuck is?"

      Smacking an innocent stranger upside the head with a crowbar.

      That's a crime.

    • Actually, that's not a crime. Unless you are in a monopoly situation. Which is exactly what AMD has said, again and again.
      • actually it doesn't matter if they're a monopoly or not. the very act of changing the price of their product if the merchant agrees not to buy a competitor's product is illegal. hence they're criminals.

    • Tortious interference (Score:4, Informative)

      by Brian Stretch ( 5304 ) * on Friday September 02, 2005 @11:00AM (#13464350)
      It's called tortious interference [wikipedia.org]. Near as I can tell, Intel is guilty as hell. This lawsuit was a long time coming. AMD is now just strong enough that chip customers are willing to take a chance and cooperate with the investigation. If Intel retaliates it won't hurt as much anymore.
    • Intel says: "If you buy AMD chips for your notebooks you'll just get a chip. You'll still have to go and part out motherboards, wireless chips, video cards, everything. On the other hand, you go with Intel, we'll give you an integrated motherboard with everything. You get the whole ball of wax from us, cheap! And if you want, you can pay us for a license to the Centrino brand name, too."

      That's an incentive to buy Intel. It's also a disincentive against buying AMD. It also sounds like good business sense to
      • Intel says: "If you buy AMD chips for your notebooks you'll just get a chip. You'll still have to go and part out motherboards, wireless chips, video cards, everything. On the other hand, you go with Intel, we'll give you an integrated motherboard with everything. You get the whole ball of wax from us, cheap! And if you want, you can pay us for a license to the Centrino brand name, too."

        That's an incentive to buy Intel. It's also a disincentive against buying AMD. It also sounds like good business sense to

  • Intel's full response (Score:4, Informative)

    by brajesh ( 847246 ) <{brajesh.sachan} {at} {gmail.com}> on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:40AM (#13463470) Homepage

    Intel's official press release and [intel.com]text of filing [nytimes.com](.pdf)

  • Took them nine weeks? (Score:4, Funny)

    by kihjin ( 866070 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:41AM (#13463475)
    Intel's formal response came nine weeks after A.M.D. accused Intel of unfair pricing and rebates, and of coercing customers to prevent them from using A.M.D. microprocessors. At 63 pages, the Intel rebuttal was 15 pages longer than the lawsuit itself.
    ... time for an upgrade?

  • Blah blah blah (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SpazAttak ( 104723 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:43AM (#13463487)
    Intel is right to an extent. AMD has always had trouble with production and all that. But that doesn't really address AMD's assertion of Intel's anti-competative practices in the least. They seem to be hoping everyone will be too busy saying 'oooooh snap' to realize that its all a bunch of double-talk.
    • Do geeks really say 'oooooh snap'?
      • Do geeks really say 'oooooh snap'?

        Of course not. No one with an IQ over room temperature does. Neither do we say "BUS-TED!", or "PSYCHE!" Those are reserved for annoying children.

    • ``Intel is right to an extent. AMD has always had trouble with production and all that.''

      Undoubtedly, but it's not like Intel has always been able to deliver what they promised. I myself have seen more cases where Intel CPUs were officially out but not available due to supply problems than AMD ones. But then, I'm not much into Intel nor AMD CPUs...

    • Re:Blah blah blah (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Red Flayer ( 890720 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @09:32AM (#13463799) Journal
      Intel is also trying to limit their liability by disproving any claims for damages.

      But, if AMD was not competitive due to internal problems, why would Intel need to bother strong-arming their clients?

    • Re:Blah blah blah (Score:3, Informative)

      by drsmithy ( 35869 )
      Intel is right to an extent. AMD has always had trouble with production and all that.

      Historically, AMD's biggest problem has always been decent supporting hardware (ie: motherboards - in particular, VIA chipsets), especially at the higher end.

      Ironically, there are now a lot of kick-arse high end Opteron motherboards available, but much of the market has moved towards many low-powered machines rather than a small number of high powered machines - and there aren't any decent low-end Opteron motherboards (fo

      • If your argument were true, then it still does not explain how the world's #1 PC seller (who designs and manufacturers their OWN motherboards) would be affected by AMD's motherboard incompetence?

        So, why is Dell still Intel-only? Someone explain to me how Dell, who is #1 in the world and has chosen Intel, makes money selling PC's in a market where the rest of the PC vendors barely scrape by? If there were more money to be had by going with AMD, then why doesn't Dell choose that route and even further bury

  • Intel == Evil? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by putko ( 753330 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @08:43AM (#13463488) Homepage Journal
    I've gotten the impression that Intel is evil, and you don't want to mess with them.

    Is AMD evil enough? Or is this just some P.R. campaign for them, where they hope to get some serious attention and maybe a bit of business based on their competitive offerings?

    I wish AMD all the luck!
    • not nearly as evil as intel.

      unfortunetly in this world, sometimes you don't have the choice to go with a saint over a devil.

      amd is a part of the Insidious Computing group. intel, microsoft, apple, ibm are also part of that group. the thing is, in a free market amd would be able not to cripple their chips and still win with the end-users. but if they don't cripple the chips, they'll be left out in the cold.

      it's collusion by means of coercion. it doesn't make sense to increase the die space and complexity of

  • My response (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Anita Coney ( 648748 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @09:02AM (#13463584) Homepage
    If I were Intel I'd respond by drastically lowering prices for a few years. By the time the lawsuit actually got to trial AMD would have long since went out of business.

    • Re:My response (Score:5, Interesting)

      by tomstdenis ( 446163 ) <tomstdenis.gmail@com> on Friday September 02, 2005 @09:10AM (#13463629) Homepage
      Eventually people will catch on that Intel processors are shit.

      Even though my AMD dual core cost 2x that of my Intel dual-core 820 it was well worth it.

      First off, the AMD dual core takes less power. Second, it's much more efficient in terms of IPC. I still clock a 3x improvement in bignum maht and both processors are 64-bit designs!!!

      Sure that means little to the average consumer but it can only go on so far. People who need to do serious computing [e.g. servers, workstations, etc] can't use Intel processors because they're so f'ing wasteful.

      Sure the PM may be good for laptops but so would a 1Ghz Crusoe...

      Tom
      • Eventually people will catch on that Intel processors are shit.
        (...)
        Sure that means little to the average consumer but it can only go on so far.

        Those two are almost a contradiction in terms. If it does what I want, it's not shit. Most people haven't felt the influence of CPU speed in ages, particularly because manufacturers have been selling high GHz, low memory machines which crash dive into swapping.

        At best, consumers don't notice a thing going from Intel to AMD (except on the price tag, but they don't se
    • and what if you were microsoft being accused of anti-competitive practices and other illegal behavior?

      what would you do then?
      • Where have you been the last decade? Do you REALLY think the feds care about anti-trust cases?! At best Intel would get a slap on the wrist while the other wrist would be used for burying AMD's casket.
    • It's not like AMD is a cheaper-and-suckier, they do make a good-quality product. In many cases their product is as good as, or better than Intel's, but they lack the production and PR. Also, AMD has nailed 64-bit technology, and when more take advantage of it (specifically servers needing more than 4GB of RAM) AMD will rise.

  • Anti-Trust (Score:2, Insightful)

    by LegendOfLink ( 574790 )
    I don't know if I actually believe anti-trust laws are a good thing. I mean, let's take a look at the market, Intel had the crown in the beginning for a long time; then AMD put out something better (Athlon) and for a while, people were flocking towards AMD (be it for the cheaper prices or the underdog appeal).

    During those times when the cut-throat competition between Intel and AMD brought about great changes on processor speed and performance (remember how fast we went from 266Mhz to 1Ghz?) it seemed ther
    • Your assuming that the superior technology will win out in the end. Seems to me I have been through no less than 3 64-bit computers in the last ten years, and My newest has a chance of lasting more than 2 years simply because it is running windows.

      Sorry, I really dont think the tech will win. The mony will win, as usual, when Intel can convince people that they not only NEED Intel processors, (when was the last time you saw an AMD logo, let alone a commercial, on TV?) but that there is no competition to s

      • Not to mention, they have to be able to afford to innovate. These designs don't come to engineers in their sleep (well, not all of them). They have to be able to make a living while they work on a design that can beat the big guy. If there is illegal behavior going on, it could create an environment where they have a better product but are financially unable to bring it to market.
    • The whole point of antitrust laws is to enable competition.

      If what AMD is saying is true, then they would have done *even better* if Intel hadn't done illegal things to protect their near-monopoly.

      • How would it have been possible for AMD to have done better if they are absolutely maxed out in manufacturing capacity as it is right now? The best point that Intel made in this legal filing was that they have invested billions of dollars on new fabs and manufacturing technologies over the past several years, and AMD has not. Intel's investment has paid off, but AMD is unable to meet their demand. There is nobody to blame for that but AMD.

    • Re:Anti-Trust (Score:5, Insightful)

      by jim_v2000 ( 818799 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @09:40AM (#13463861)
      I use AMD for all my rigs; but is there really a need for the anti-trust laws today? The next company to build the better processor will get their advantage, instead of just watching who will win the next lawsuit.

      You're looking at this from an I-Build-My-Own-Computer perspective. AMD doesn't care about selling to you. You're pocket change. AMD wants to sell to Dell, Compaq, HP, Gateway....the commercial market. And right now AMD is claiming that because of financial blackmail, Intel is keeping AMD from being able to compete in that market.
    • Just because things haven't ended in disaster (yet) in this case doesn't mean we don't need anti-trust laws. Intel can use their enormous capital to hinder AMD in a number of ways. This means AMD won't get its fair change to compete, they won't get as much money to spend on R&D, and everybody loses.

      And indeed, as another poster pointed out, anti-trust laws are necessary (though not sufficient) to prevent monopolies from forming. I think we all know what harm monopolies can do...
    • It was the best first generation Athlon motherboard out there. But Asus would not admit to actually MAKING the board at all. Why? They were afraid of Intel.

      Here's a link to help you remember:
      http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=1153 [anandtech.com]

      Click on the board's picture and look for the Asus name. It's usually printed quite clearly on the PCB.

      You may remember the past as rosey, but I remember the FIC SD11, Asus K7M, and the Gigabyte boards as the only three available. No manufacturer wanted to piss off Intel. I
    • Your history is a little off. People didn't just "flock" to AMD. AMD fought tooth-and-nail with prices nearly half those of Intels starting around the same time Intel release the Pentium.

      Athlons came much, much later.

      Maybe they're starting to get frustrated that they don't have more marketshare than Intel already?
      They're usually cheaper, and they usually outperform.

      It can take a while for an engineering company to realize that their competition is being underhanded. Today, it's certainly late enough in t

    • Re:Anti-Trust (Score:2, Interesting)

      by webwaster ( 851163 )
      Actually, what you've stated shows the need for this kind of lawsuit. Intel on top for a long time. AMD comes around, develops a better CPU for less $$$. Intel counters. Heavy competition leads to great innovation and avancement for a while. So why the sudden lag in innovation?

      Intel tires of putting so much time and money into chip development and tech advancement to protect their share of the pie, resources they'd much rather spend on marketing ("Intel Inside" - then those four little musical notes we

    • Re:Anti-Trust (Score:3, Informative)

      by Chris Burke ( 6130 )
      I don't know if I actually believe anti-trust laws are a good thing. I mean, let's take a look at the market ... it seemed there wasn't any need for lawsuits.

      Yes, because Intel's actions were greatly limited by anti-trust law!

      Intel is alleged to have anti-competitive practices by basing their prices to OEMs on how many AMD parts they sold, as a direct financial incentive to not buy AMD, and supposedly several major OEMs caputilated entirely and dropped AMD from their lines. Yay market?

      And that's with Int
  • At the end of the day the only people that will really benefit from this whole scenario are the lawyers. Either way they get paid out so they dont really care. There has been several antitrust cases brought before intel in the past.. there must be some level of truth to it otherwise there would be even more risk for AMD that has just began to emerge in the last few years after a disasterous run in with intel previously.

  • Damages (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Red Flayer ( 890720 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @09:18AM (#13463686) Journal
    I'm not sure that Intel is disputing that they took unfair trade actions. They are disputing whether any damages resulted.

    Intel is saying that AMD shot themselves in the foot by not having enough production capacity, and even if Intel leveraged their weight against AMD, there were no damages as a result of it.

    If the court finds in favor of AMD, it'll add up to a small fine and some bad press... unless AMD can prove damages and make Intel pay.

    AMD (and any other plaintiffs, should the cases be consolidated) has a hell of a battle in front of them.
    • Does it matter who (if anyone) gets hurt? Granted penalties might be lesser, but a law broken is still a law broken, and Intel should be held responsible.
      • Yes, it does matter. This is a civil suit, whereby AMD is attempting to collect damages from Intel.

        The point of the suit is not to punish Intel (although that is often a byproduct) -- the point of the suit is for AMD to be compensated for their loss.

  • The reason for the lawsuit (Score:5, Insightful)

    by vojtech ( 565680 ) <vojtech@suse.cz> on Friday September 02, 2005 @09:31AM (#13463788)
    It's just pure speculation, but I guess the real reason for the antitrust lawsuit by AMD is the Turion® mobile CPU.

    AMD can't sell the Turions in the white-box market, where most of its CPUs are being sold, and must rely on bigger players in the PC industry, like Dell or HP to include it in their notebooks.

    After all, who builds his notebook himself at home?

    Now just the fact of the existence of the lawsuit will force Intel to tone down on their rebate practices, and this may open a window for AMD to sell the chips in quantities larger than the bare usually allowed by Intel's rebate system.

    Good luck, AMD!

    • I agree completely, both in terms of what market they are seeking to affect, and what they will consider success.

      All AMD has to do is get Intel to back off a bit from stuff that would get them in hot water legally, and AMD has invested the lawsuit money wisely.

      They don't need to win, they merely need to get Intel to be a bit more paranoid about sticking to the letter of the law in their dealings with OEMs.

      I really wish AMD the best with this lawsuit, because in my opinion, they make a superior product, for
    • actually it isn't pure speculation at all.

      japan busted intel for the very same things amd is "alleging".

      and south korea is also moving to bring charges against intel.

      intel=microsoft. for people who have a clue as to what goes on in the industry, they know it as fact.

      they aren't rumors to people in the know.

  • Surely thats no defense. (Score:3, Insightful)

    by malsdavis ( 542216 ) * on Friday September 02, 2005 @09:33AM (#13463805)
    "The evidence will show that every failure and setback for which A.M.D. today seeks to blame Intel is actually a direct result of A.M.D.'s own actions or inactions."

    So basically their saying that AMD also had the oppurtunity to act as deceitfully as Intel do, but because they didn't it's their own fault?
    Sounds like an admission of guilt to me.

  • I admire the way Intel's going about this. They know they're caught, so they use their response to badmouth AMD.

    Hey, everyone, lookit here! AMD has crap management! They can't meet demand for their product! Their production is teh suxx0r!

  • Too much Kool-Aid around here! (Score:4, Insightful)

    by goldspider ( 445116 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @10:16AM (#13463981) Homepage
    0mg wtf? Intel is t3h sux0r!

    Seriously people, a lot of you need to start looking at things more objectively. Maybe Intel illegally leverages its market power. Maybe poor planning and management have hindered AMD's growth.

    But to dismiss either side purely on ideology doesn't speak highly of your ability (or willingness) to comprehensively consider issues like this.

    Let's wait for the facts to come out, and then we can start making our judgements.

    • Re:Too much Kool-Aid around here! (Score:5, Insightful)

      by KagatoLNX ( 141673 ) <kagato@NospaM.souja.net> on Friday September 02, 2005 @11:24AM (#13464525) Homepage
      I've always pitied AMD because they seem to have a better engineered product (certain K6s and K6-2s excepted) but never seem to get anywhere because the right people don't adopt their product. Until fairly recently, I couldn't get a SuperMicro server with an AMD in it. Even now you can supposedly get an Opteron, but can't fit it in all of their rackmount options and they don't even list it on their web site!

      It's the deals like this that make it really tough for AMD. Admittedly, as a customer, I can't find a vendor that satisfies my need for an inexpensive, reliable, AMD-based server. Looking a their pricing, this isn't AMDs fault and I don't really believe it's a technical issue either.

      Similarly you'll note the dearth of 4+ processor AMD systems. This is important. Their MP model makes it easy to scale this high and it shows in the custom market (many 32/64 proc Opteron options if you're buying a custom-built supercomputer). However, the low end ones are not being built and its only because Intel puts a lot of pressure on its technology partners to insure that they can't afford to build a sub-$800 8-processor Opteron board. Either you lose your processor pricing or you'll get exciting new "patent-licensing" deals.

      WRT to the market forces involved, the assumption is that, barring bad management, a good product at the right price should prevail. While Intel can complain about AMD's management, I think the problem is that they never have the money to operate correctly because of Intel's influence. The effective choice is that your management can hinder the company to match the amount of business the monopolist lets you have or it can operate with an aggressive but realistic business plan that falls on its face because of illegal practices. In short, Intel says, "your management should have planned for the material damages from our illegal activities" and AMD should very much answer "damages are damages, it may not have been really good business to not account well for them, but that doesn't dimish your responsibility for the damage".

      And as for "waiting for the facts to come out", this is a court room. I'm sure any facts involved will be mangled beyond all recognition once they finally "come out".
      • "While Intel can complain about AMD's management, I think the problem is that they never have the money to operate correctly because of Intel's influence." (emphasis mine)

        From that point on, everything you say is speculation. It all might very well turn out to be true, but that's why we have courts to determine these things instead if incredibly biased mobs.

        I suspect that you won't be satisfied with any court ruling in favor of Intel, or against AMD. That tells me that "winning" is more important to you t

      • Until fairly recently, I couldn't get a SuperMicro server with an AMD in it.

        As far as I can tell, you still can't.

        The only Supermicro board I can find that supports AMD is the H8DCE [supermicro.com] which does not seem to be available to retail customers.

        I even wonder if this board's existence is a result of the AMD lawsuit. For a long time now I've been puzzled as to why Supermicro was so steadfast in it's Intel-only stance. For a company that specializes in wide range of server boards, you would think they woul

  • Of course Intel is saying that they're a monopoly because AMD produces faulty products.

    No company it its right mind is going to confess to maintaining an illegal monopoly, at least not with the current administration and weak anti-trust laws. Intel is going to go into court with a straight face and say "It's AMD's fault, and the customer's choice", and they are going to keep saying it.

    It would be news if they said anyting else.

    • It is not illegal to be a monopoly or maintain a monopoly in the US. If you're so successful that you beat the pants off everyone else in your market, that's fine.

      It is only illegal to use your monopoly position to shut competition out of the market through preferential supply, below-cost pricing, or back-room dealing.

      For example, most public utilities, ILECs, Major Leage Baseball, and ICANN are all monopolies that are legal in the US.

  • This reminds me of 3Dfx v/s nVidia (Score:3, Interesting)

    by PinkX ( 607183 ) on Friday September 02, 2005 @10:47AM (#13464238) Homepage
    You know, all those lawsuits coming and going between the (then) 3D graphics giant and pioneer 3Dfx and the newcomer nVidia.

    Then, to the surprise of all of us, nVidia bought 3Dfx, dismissing all the mutual lawsuits and absorbing (or ditching, if you want) all of its technology.

    However, any similarities are just that.

    Regards,

  • AMD Admits capacity restriaint - NOT suffering (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Everyone here should note that AMD admits that they are "capacity restrained", meaning they sell EVERY SINGLE PIECE of product they manufacture, and at the end of the day they don't even have enough capacity to satisfy all their orders.

    SO, how can AMD argue that they are under the thumb of a vicious monopoly when they themselves are responsible for their own lacking ability to truley attack the marketplace? Is Intel to blaim for their unwillingness to invest in adequate production to meet the demands of a g


    • AMD admits that now they are capacity restrained, but that was not always the case. The reality is that AMD has begun to chip away at Intel in the last two years, but that's not a result of Intel releasing its iron grip on OEM's -- its just a matter of AMD having the clearly superior product. But the AMD's claims suggest, that if AMD and Intel had *equal* products, AMD's market share would not improve, even if their prices were lower.

      Using evidence of capacity would be holding AMD's own against-all-advers
  • This banter between AMD and Intel reminds me of Monty Python's Life of Brian.

    Brian: I'm not the Messiah! Will you please listen? I am not the Messiah, do you understand? Honestly!
    Girl: Only the true Messiah denies His divinity.
    Brian: What? Well, what sort of chance does that give me? All right! I am the Messiah!
    Followers: He is! He is the Messiah!
    Brian: Now, fuck off!
    [silence]
    Arthur: How shall we fuck off, O Lord?

  • I've been waiting for Intel to issue a press release admitting that they were wrong in every aspect and that AMD has a strong case against them. Intel's claims of innocence really threw me for a loop.

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