Prior to AMD buying ATI... and prior to the release of the CORE 2 micro-architecture... AMD have been struggling in producing chips in volumes... the problem was that they had too few fabs to produce chips in quantities for both OEMs and retail channel...
have a look into this scenario...
If AMD didn't buy ATI... and if they invested in fabs... regardless of the architecture, they could produce a lot of chips in quantity to satisfy OEM's volume orders and have more than enough to fill retail channels (to avoid those ridiculous paper launches).
Even if the margin of profit is small, they can make it up with volumes...
Another importance in investing in fabs, they can be in a better position to improve on their manufacturing process. something that they badly need on their 65nm...
[Posted by: bleep | Date: 12/17/07 12:39:00 PM]