Markt analisten blijken niet onder de indruk te zijn van de AMD Athlon processor. Ze verwachten 'disaster for the company' en denken dat AMD niet aan de vraag naar Athlon processors zal kunnen voldoen (het bekende verhaaltje). Hier heb je wat knipwerk uit een artikel van News.com:
"We are not convinced that AMD can pull it off," Merrill Lynch's Joseph Osha said in a recent report stating that AMD faces "substantial challenges." AMD has been plagued by losses over the years, even when it managed to take the lion's share of the retail consumer PC segment.
Also, "convincing [PC makers] to buy AMD in the non-value segment, where reliability and deliverability are just as important as price [is a challenge,]" the report said.
This puts Intel in a strong position. "The Intel competitive position now looks as good as it has been for some time. The low end of market, which is where the threat lay, has cleared out. AMD is reduced to a Hail Mary strategy which, despite impressive specs for Athlon on paper, has little chance of success," according to the Merril Lynch report.
Others are also cautious. "AMD has made a series of questionable decisions recently that are difficult to rationalize reviewing...their performance at retail. Pulling out of the low-end chip market, while unprofitable, gives them no legs to stand on," Alison Boswell wrote in the Boswell Report.
"While AMD shows improvement in sales and market share...they seem less of a threat than ever in light of recent announcements," said Boswell.
Ominously she added, "Their image is based on price, and as our research has shown over the last six months, consumers have little interest in the brand otherwise. Time and again they have tried to compete with Intel's high-end products and failed, as the K6-3 is a prime example." She concludes that "chronic problems" along with resignation of Atiq Raza, president and COO, spell "disaster for the company."
