NVIDIA Accuses Intel of Unfair Pricing

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According to Reuters, NVIDIA has made a statement accusing Intel of unfair pricing practices. The complaint seems to be that Intel sells Atom bundles cheaper than the Atom by itself. NVIDIA has vowed to “do whatever we have to do when the time comes.” Maybe that means they will sell the ION for cheaper than the Atom bundles and the problem will be solved.

Nvidia makes graphics chips that pair with Intel's low-powered Atom in lower-priced netbook computers. He said Intel sells an Atom chip by itself for $45, but sells a three-chip set for $25 to lure business away. "That seems pretty unfair," he said. "We ought to be able to compete and serve that market."
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Nvidia make a product that costs less than $25? Never happen. They would probably rather scrap the chip.
 
The response is hilarious:
"We compete fairly. We do not force bundles on any computer makers and customers can purchase Atom individually or as part of the bundle," said Bill Calder, a spokesman for Intel. "If you want to purchase the chip set, obviously there is better pricing."
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Better pricing as in half the price of a single chip ;)
I'm assuming that there's a problem with the information somewhere and the price of a chip set will be $75 (3x$25), which would make sense. If not, then Intel better brace for another hefty fine...
 
Wait. So nvidia is pissed because Intel is selling a bundle cheaper than their chip alone?


Isn't nvidia the company that wont let anyone including intel use its SLI technology, so the only way to get SLI is to get nvidia?

Ironic.
 
Maybe that means they will sell the ION for cheaper than the Atom bundles and the problem will be solved.
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Never, ever, ever, ever. Seriously. Never.

Didn't nvidia have those funny pricing policies where online retailers had to match prices for the same cards from different vendors? Poor intel, someone started throwing tomatoes and now everyone and his dog joins in for some image polishing.
 
Right. And NVIDIA prices their own products way to high and they accuse Intel of unfair pricing? I've always thought both NVIDIA and Intel are a match made in heaven.
 
And people isnt reading the whole story, or isnt thinking about it, surely we all do :)

But the case is, a cpu sells at 45 dollars, and when you buy a motherboard with intelchipset, you pay less than the cpu itself.

Its fine by me if cpu goes for 30, and intel bundles at 35, and nvidia sells at 60, no problem, its worth it!

but when priced lower than one of the products, and almost halfed when you bundle it with alot else, its getting a quite mean strategy.
 
NVIDIA has been doing the "You have to buy X number of this Y GPU, in order to get X number of Z GPU for years." This reaches into its chipset market as well. Pot, meet kettle. I
 
AtkinS said:
but when priced lower than one of the products, and almost halfed when you bundle it with alot else, its getting a quite mean strategy.
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And Intel can easily argue that this is its strategy in order to keep device builders from packaging its shiny ATOM processor with dogshit silicon that will make it look bad. (Queue memories of nForce.)
 
For those who can't read :
Intel Atom = $45
Intel Atom + 945 northbridge + ICH7R southbridge = $25

This is exactly the thing for which you get heavy, heavy fines.
 
faugusztin said:
For those who can't read :
Intel Atom = $45
Intel Atom + 945 northbridge + ICH7R southbridge = $25

This is exactly the thing for which you get heavy, heavy fines.
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I read the original article and can't find what you just wrote. I already quoted what was already said by Intel in response.

It appears that one can buy:
Intel Atom for $45
or
3x Intel Atom for $25 (making no sense)
or
3x Intel Atom for 3x$25
or
Intel Atom + NB + SB for $25 (but I can't find any source for your claim)
 
I dont think they can necessarily be fined or sued unless they are selling some things at a loss in order to gain marketshare or retain it.
 
"We ought to be able to compete and serve that market."
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I'm not quite sure they know what 'compete' means. When did compete go from whoever can offer the best product at the cheapest price to today's meaning of "They aren't playing ball and charging our higher prices, that's unfair!"

You know what - I don't care what it cost the company to make a product -- I care what they are charging me. I care if somebody else can offer something better or cheaper or both. I think regulation on some industries that have shown an inherent inability to be stable and maintain competition on their own is reasonable (yes, control banks, they've shown they can't be left to their own devices, and we've shown them we are willing to pull out all stops to keep them from failing which will only embolden future risk taking; yes, we should regulate TV/internet providers because inherently it would be chaos if every competitor had to string their own lines along the poles).

But an industry like chipsets? There are multiple companies competing (AMD/nVidia/Intel/Via/SiS just to name a few), if one fails there is no systematic risk to other industries, and there are no inherent physical limitations that provide a benefit to society to have one pipeline ala water/gas/internet. Let them duke it out - if at some point Intel runs nVidia out of the chipset market, there is nothing to stop a company from coming into the market later if Intel jacks their prices up and tries to abuse their position in the market.
 
Ok, someone call the Wambulance for nVidia.

I'm really tired f this crap.
 
Of course Nvidia is going to join in on the Intel bashing,everyone knows they have a running feud with them,mainly because Intel pretty much killed their chipset business once SLI support became available on Intel's boards.Nvidia's own pricing has hardly been fair in the past,it wasn't until ATI became competitive again that their prices came down.
 
why dont they just buy the 3-chip chipset and throw the rest of the crap in the bin? save $20...
 
whats stopping someone from buying the bundle, AND the nvidia chipset, and making a product? i dont see how its unfair if they can just buy the bundle, then the nvidia chipset. anyone care to explain?
 
Probably the PO has agreements in it that says you must use all 3 on the same MB or something along those lines... if Intel can prove your not your SOL in fines... and/or get on Intel's bad side and find your shipments delayed, etc etc etc :0
 
by the time the fine comes into play and Intel is forced to stop Nvidia will be out like 2 years business. Intel is smart well worth the fines.
 
i think a lot of people in this thread associate (incorrectly, in my opinion) 'high prices' with unfair prices.
 
RussianHAXOR said:
I dont think they can necessarily be fined or sued unless they are selling some things at a loss in order to gain marketshare or retain it.
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not sure about that, can i sue sony for the ps3 then? lol
 
Intel merges with nvidia, then it will be done with .

AMD/ATI vs Intel/Nvidia.

Maybe then we can get some price drops and stop all the gibber jabber.
 
stainremover said:
i think a lot of people in this thread associate (incorrectly, in my opinion) 'high prices' with unfair prices.
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I agree. Isnt freedom of entrepreneurship / capitalism a little bit contradicting of "unfair" pricing laws? Same with monopolies. Isnt a monopoly a lifelong goal of any company?
 
What about NVIDIA's system on a chip called Tegra, if that ever comes out I think it might wipe the floor with the Atom. I just hope it comes out in the Zune HD.
 
Using the $25 bundle with ION has no point. Manufacturers can choose $25 bundle, or $25 bundle and slap a ION here for some money - but that means they will have higher price than the standard Atom bundle in every possible combination.

In my opinion, pricing the bundle bellow price of single product from that bundle is a very grey area and Intel should be very sure that it's legal to do this. Especially in their position of the biggest player on market.
 
marylandman said:
whats stopping someone from buying the bundle, AND the nvidia chipset, and making a product? i dont see how its unfair if they can just buy the bundle, then the nvidia chipset. anyone care to explain?
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You just spent less money on all the objects you need, why would you spend more money on other items (that in the past have proven to be inferior junk with intel) just to use both companies?

Nvidia has a point, a rather small point, its mainly them crying that they can't sell their stuff to vendors for rediculous prices, if they wanted to get into this market is possibly the bloodiest of them all and yes Intel definitely has the strong arm here... they've had the low low low end market cornered since inception, starting with the celeron.
 
One evil company isn't playing fair with another evil company. Sounds like a perfect recipe for a deathmatch! :p
 
i'd just like to take this opportunity to state that until NVIDIA starts making drivers worth a damn i'm going to ATI.
 
mope54 said:
Atom + NB + SB for $25 (but I can't find any source for your claim)
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That is what I read into Huang's "3 chips for $25" vs. $45 for Atom alone claim, though the article doesn't explicitly state what the 3 chips are.

If true, this would mean Intel is effectively paying customers $20 to take a NB+SB along with their $45 Atom.
So what does that do to fair competition for the Atom chipset market?
 
What he is saying can be taken multiple ways. Whether or not his assertion is correct, in the way he actually means it, is in question as well.

Buy more get each unit for less is an ancient means of rewarding your largest customers.

Then again this may indeed be a Gray or Black area tactic by Intel. They may wish to stall Nv for a time to entrench themselves or simply fear than Nv will fuck up Atom's name with some possibly shoddy chip set. Nv is known for the widely varying quality of it's chip sets. One will be great, the next one may suck, and the one after that may be passably good. You never know with Nv chip sets.
 
The Atom is Intel's CPU, why are they required to even let another manufacturer produce a chipset for it, let alone dictate how they price it?
 
I am a huge Nvidia fan but I couldn't hold back...

Business isn't always fair, business is war. If you can't be competitive in a given market on your own, then get out of that market. This is all horse shit...

...what is our society and country becoming???
 
Pabuchok, there is one small problem with your argument. No one can be competitive in this specific segment of market, because Intel is using lower prices for the bundle than for single part of the bundle to sell stocks of his old chipset... And that can be punished, if someone fills a antitrust claim :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Predatory_pricing
 
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