I visited the relatively new AMD campus here in Austin today, where the chipmaker employs about 2,600 people, for an overview of the products and computing trends that the company is keeping its eye on. Below is a quick video I shot of Pat Moorhead, V-P of advanced marketing, talking about AMD’s absence from the netbook and MID market. Basically the company isn’t sold on the idea of a third consumer device, sized between a smartphone and a laptop, because it believes that would involve too much of a compromise in terms of the features that consumers expect.
When it comes to building small, form-factor PCs, Moorhead says 13-inch, super-sleek laptops will find a place, and perhaps a laptop with a 9-inch to 10-inch screen. For smaller devices, consumers will likely be happier with a smartphone (such as the G1 phone Moorhead shows off with obvious pride). Moorhead avoided giving any details about the overall strategy, other than affirming AMD’s commitment to the x86 architecture, but did say AMD planned to outline more of its MID plans at a Nov. 13 analyst meeting.
This is a good strategy for AMD, assuming morehead is accurate on the 300M x86 number, which given his level, I am sure he is. In addition to the iphone and g1 android, he failed to mention the blackberry smartphone. With those three devices blowing and going, the MID will get SQUASHED between the netbook and smartphones.
Netbooks and MIDs need to watch out for the “iPhone effect”. A recent comScore study reveals that iPhone may be taking the place of netbooks in low-income households.
http://mobilebroadbandblog.wordpress.com/2008/10/31/iphone-platform-for-the-masses/
Sorry, but the fact that AMD can’t come to the market with something that beats centrino’s power efficiency (let’s not mention Atom) says more about this statement that any market theory they can come up with.
AMD is missing the boat. To the consumer the netbook is not really a new device. It is a laptop that consumers can afford. For years consumers have wanted a laptop priced in the same range as the low-end desktop. How can AMD not have seen this?