1) Intel is clearly not tied to the 'status qou'. For that matter, there has never been a 'status quo' in the processor market. Were Intel tied to some form of whimsical internal 'status quo' they would have continued producing substandard products and selling them through advertising. That this tactic was slowly failing against AMD’s then superior products is undeniably demonstrated by the shifts in overall market share. For whatever reason, Intel clearly did not maintain its 'status quo' and responded to the threat AMD was presenting to its market share.
The real question is, just why do you presume that should AMD challenge this notional 'status quo' again, that Intel would not respond as it did in 2004? Good will perhaps?
2) Interestingly, you speak of focus, yet you recommend AMD do this by attacking multiple fronts?
"Pick the areas where Intel is most exposed - graphics, OEMs, Microsoft and end users - and resource them. This is actually a set of things that AMD has been known to do well, but they tend to under resource the efforts, which has reduced the returns substantially."
Perhaps you should reference a dictionary as to the meaning of the word "focus". What you recommend, trying to expand, was precisely the factor that put AMD into its current predicament. The purchase of ATI to expand into platform, graphics, and aid development of integrated CPU/GPUs stretched AMD far too thin, both in assets and operational funding.
3) Quality over quantity. Saying that AMD needs to improve its quality is a no-brainer. Congratulations on that particular armchair quarterback pass, even if it is 2 season too late. Perhaps you should study your history a bit more as AMD was on the path of quality over quantity. They abandoned that path when they purchased ATI. In the 2 years following the purchase of ATI, AMD delivered products that were at best, nothing to write home about (X2, Brisbane) at worst abysmal phailures. (Phenom, 4x4) Rather than delivering "the goods", AMD delivered 'the Intel'. That is, AMD delivered lots of adver-hype with little quality or performance... For them, the real trick will be doing that on their ever shrinking recourses; cash, talent and equipment. If you want to demonstrate some true analysis rather than some 2-season too late arm chair quarterbacking, why not actually devise a plan for AMD to dig its way out of its quality conundrum, given its current recourses factoring in its current rate of cash loss. You should probably plan to demonstrate results before Intel releases its next generation micro-architecture.
4)Fund great marketing:
AMD Quadfather: "The Ultimate Enthusiast Platform"
"AMD Phenom processors: exceptional next-generation architecture designed to provide advanced multitasking performance for today’s more demanding PC users"
"Quadcore for dummies", or 'how to bury your face in the egg 18 months before you have a product'
Shall I go on? Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. So to is advertising. Frankly, even if AMD could afford it, which they can’t, given their track record with "Great Marketing", they would be better off burning the money. The money they spent on marketing Quadfather and Phenom did far more damage than good by raising the various markets expectations, (while publicly belittling their competition) then phailing phantastically to deliver. This is not an exaggeration.
What AMD needs to do, in 4 short paragraphs
1) Get back on the battlefield. To “change the battlefield”, AMD must actually be on the battlefield. AMD is currently somewhere in the rear with the gear, lying on a stretcher in the hospital tent, moaning in agony. To get back on the battlefield they need to focus.
2) Focus. Duh. Not your version of focus, but the real meaning; to concentrate. Focus does not mean spreading yourself further by trying to identify and attack all of your opposition’s weak points. It does not mean building more graphics cards while working deals with software manufactures to specialize and trying to make deals with OEMS. In case you didn’t notice, the deal with Dell hurt AMD as much as it helped. AMD lacks the capacity to supply everyone at once, so they must focus. OEMS or Channel. Graphics or CPUs. They are no longer in a position to fight a war on multiple fronts, and at this point, they have gone so far down the path to CH 11 that its going to be up to governments to bail them out since it is unlikely (given their product record and stock performance the past 2 years) that commerce is going to invest much more in them.
3) Quality over quantity. Focus efforts on producing a quality product rather than producing mediocre products for multiple markets. They lack the recourses to produce multiple products for multiple markets, and they have used up the reputation they struggled so hard to build. They must now get ‘back to basics’, focus on building one product and building it well, in order to rebuild both their reputation and their finances
4) Great Marketing. NOT. The very last thing AMD needs to do now is spend more money advertising products it can not deliver. AMD needs to take that money and spend it on improving the quality of their products, not the quality of their advertising. While you may live in the micro-cosmic world of BS sells, they rest of us live in the ‘Money talks, BS walks world’. No matter how much AMD spends on marketing, they will continue to lose if they don’t have the product to back their claims….You can fool some of the people some of the time, and some of the people all of the time, but you cant fool all of the people all of the time, and no amount of marketing can mask the failure of a product that can not provide performance, reliability or value. Don’t believe it? Look at Intel’s Netburst and how AMD ate away at Intel’s market share even when Intel was dumping ridiculous amounts of money into marketing. Intel learned its lesson…if you build a better mouse trap the world will beat a path to your door...will AMD learn its lesson?