Expreviewov intervju s Nvidijinim CEO-om, Jen-Hsunom

[Razer]

We managed to have a conversation with Jen-Hsun Huang, the CEO and co-founder of NVIDIA a few days ago, and Huang presented many of his thoughts, especially on several hot topics such as the company’s quarterly loss and its main rival - AMD and Intel. Read on to find out what Huang has to say.

Q: how do you think of the current relation between AMD, Intel and NVIDIA?

Jen-Hsun: Both Intel and AMD make chips for notebooks, servers and desktop PC, so their strategy is all-directional. Differently, NVIDIA’s only focus is the products in relation to visual computing. We have no plan to enter into CPU market, as Intel and AMD have already done great enough. I don’t think we can do even better, but we are capable of making the best GPUs.

CPU is designed for logical computing, while GPU is created for parallel computing. You know, the Core Processing is the present and future of PC world. Very soon, you’ll see the DirectX Computing on Windows 7 and OpenCL on Apple OS10 which operate on the CPU and GPU.

We have been trying hard to make GPUs for Intel and AMD’s platforms. Now we can support Atom, Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Quad on Ion as well as the platforms from AMD and VIA. If the market and consumers need it, we do it, and continue to work with our partners.

Q: So is NVIDIA going to take over VIA?

Jen-Hsun: We will not acquire VIA.

Q: Do you think Ion will be successful with Intel’s competition?

Jen-Hsun: Intel is a really complicated company, but we should thank Intel - it’s Intel who makes more people know about Ion, and thus more manufacturers came to us - you see lots of Ion products at ComputeX, don’t you?

Q: Intel will integrate graphics chip into their next-generation CPU, and how do you think about that?

Jen-Hsun: Intel has done the same thing to the motherboard chipset. The chips are free, because they’re not good enough. NVIDIA is providing and will continue to provide users with GeForce of higher performance.

Q: How do you think of Larrabee?

Jen-Hsun: Larrabee should be launched in 2006, Larrabee should hit retail in 2008, Larrabee should sell well in 2009, the second generation Larrabee should be out in 2010, the 3rd generation Larrabee should be out in 2011… Like all of you, I am eager to see Intel’s Larrabee.

On the other side, Intel is also well aware of the importance of GPU in PC development. CPU has been developing slowly, while GPU develops pretty fast. GPU is so important, and Intel also knows that the collaboration of CPU and GPU is the only choice.

Q: You said that NVIDIA was working on three models based on 40nm processing, and it seems that TSMC is having some problems on 40nm yield issue. Is NVIDIA planning to seek for another OEM just like Globalfoundries?

Jen Hsun: Globalfoundries is a leading silicon foundry with advanced and outstanding processing technology. We’re seriously evaluating and discussing about the possibilities of working with them. As to TSMC, we do regard it as a world-class silicon OEM with flexible strategies. We’re working very closely together.

Q: Would you mind talking something about NVIDIA’s current GPU OEMs and their proportions? Do you think NVIDIA will take the lead in manufacturing process next time?

Jen-Hsun: For now we only work with TSMC and UMC, with proportion of 90% and 10% respectively. I don’t think it’s our priority to take the lead in processing competition - what really counts is to have a good plan and get it done.

Q: NVIDIA will hold GPU Technology Conference this year, so will you hold the NVISION as well?

Jen-Hsun: We’re holding GPU Technology Conference this year, and probably NVISION next year, and then GPU Technology Conference the year after. It’s very essential to do things like this. Actually, I think 2009 should be the year of GPU Computing. We introduced the concept of CUDA about four years ago, and now there’re thousands of developers using CUDA. GPU Computing is everywhere. The conferences enable software developers all around the world, scientists, doctors to gather together, to communicate, discuss and learn.

Q: What do you think has resulted in NVIDIA’s great loss in Q1?

Jen-Hsun: I think there’re two main reasons. Firstly, the global economic recession has resulted in weak demand. Secondly, we sold so well in Q3 last year that we prepared lots of chips. When the market condition changed in Q4, the massive stock was left to us, and then influenced the first quarter this year. But now, we’ve reduced the inventory greatly to lower the risk.

Izvor: Expreview

[Jackson]

Haha, kako se sprda s Larrabeom