AMD Shifts Focus Away from High-End Graphics Cards, Conceding to NVIDIA

Why will AMD abandon the fight with Nvidia for gaming graphics cards? - Softonic

AMD only wants to make money with AI and will abandon the high-end range of the gaming GPU market For many of us, technology (or gaming in particular) is an all-out battle between AMD and Nvidia to create the best graphics card. And we, as enthusiastic gamers, argue in forums for our preferred brand. There was rarely a clear winner, but that was part of the magic. Now, 20 years after this war began in stores and internet photos, AMD decides to withdraw from the battlefield... at least when it comes to high-end gaming graphics cards. Let's explain it. AMD has spoken out to say that it now prioritizes AI chips over high-end GPUs for gamers. The company has just unveiled a new business strategy, in which it will merge its RDNA efforts for gaming graphics and CNDA for data centers into a single universal UDNA primarily aimed at AI. In two interviews granted to Tom's Hardware, AMD's Chief Computing and Graphics Officer, Jack Huynh, doesn't beat around the bush. With gaming graphics, he explains, the goal now is to increase scale and market share at lower prices, not flagship GPUs. It is clear that Nvidia has been dominating the market for years with an iron fist, hence the abandonment. And yet, being the King of the Hill (as they say in the interview) is exactly what AMD wants to build for the AI data center, because that's where AMD already has a substantial market share with its EPYC CPUs and believes it can grow by selling the best GPUs for data centers as well. "Don't worry, I love games. When I present myself to the board of directors, I say that gaming is a strategic pillar in my strategy," Huynh told Tom's Hardware later in the interview. If this sounds vaguely familiar, it's probably because AMD is following in the footsteps of its rival Nvidia, in more ways than one. AMD is becoming an AI chip company, just like Nvidia, if we take a close look at their financial reports, which show that half of the company's sales are now products for data centers. Both companies have accelerated their businesses to launch new silicon architectures every year, much faster than before. In the Tom's Hardware interview about AMD's UDNA, Huynh now reveals that he also wants to pursue the success of Nvidia's universal CUDA platform. As gamers, we like the idea of AMD leading the value-oriented GPUs, also known as dollar per performance. This is because GPUs were becoming excessively expensive and Nvidia is too comfortable with the entire graphics market.

AMD Is Giving up on High-End PC Graphics Cards

NVIDIA makes arguably the best graphics cards out there, but competition is always good and keeps the market healthy. Sadly, it appears that AMD, its closest competitor, might be backing out of the fight. AMD has announced a new business strategy that prioritizes AI chips over high-end gaming GPUs. The company will merge its gaming and data center graphics efforts into a single "UDNA" platform aimed at AI applications. AMD's computing and graphics chief, Jack Huynh, stated that the goal for gaming graphics is now to build market share at lower price points rather than competing with NVIDIA's flagship GPUs. Huynh emphasized that AMD needs to demonstrate scale to attract developers, who currently favor NVIDIA due to its larger market share. AMD is already a dominant player in the AI data center segment with its EPYC CPUs. The company believes it can further grow here by offering top-tier data center GPUs. Both NVIDIA and AMD are focusing more on AI these days, but the way they approach things might be a bit different. NVIDIA has not shown any public intent to slow down its current consumer GPU strategy. We might be in for a slight delay, as it has been two years since the launch of the company's RTX 4000-series GPUs and we don't have RTX 5000 cards yet. But the cards, codenamed Blackwell, are currently in development, and we could have news soon. Still, if NVIDIA plans to compete in the flagship GPU market without AMD, it would mean NVIDIA would have no competition there. NVIDIA could charge however much it wants for these cards without anyone else holding it accountable or pressuring it to lower prices. We could also be in for a period of stagnation in innovation, as it happened back when AMD left Intel competing by itself in the high-end CPU market before the Ryzen series came around. As we said before, competition is good, and a lack of competition makes innovation stagnate. We hope we're wrong, though. While the move might be bad news for the market at large, it might be a good move for AMD. The company was already thriving on its budget GPUs, and it's just going to devote more of its resources there. The company might be about to face some competition here, however, as Intel's second generation of Arc graphics cards, codenamed Battlemage, is due to launch any day now. Not only will it be competing against AMD in this budget segment, but also, depending on how big Intel's ambitions are here, it might actually try to give NVIDIA a run for its money in the recently-abandoned flagship segment. Source: The Verge