Samsung Slows Memory Chip Production to Keep Prices Stable

[jimmysmitty]

AMD!!! Please make RAM chips too. We will support you...

AMD has no FABs to make them and I doubt they are willing to invest the capital to start production even FABless.

What it really comes down to is the companies getting smacked by the government. As much as I am for little government intervention, lets face it they are super inefficient at things, sometimes they are useful in making companies act right.

 

[bit_user]

What it really comes down to is the companies getting smacked by the government. As much as I am for little government intervention, lets face it they are super inefficient at things, sometimes they are useful in making companies act right.

I'm sure there's tons of government involvement in semiconductor manufacturing, on all sides. Mostly, in the form of subsidies, tax breaks, and research funding.

 

[Zhyr]

This isn't technically price fixing since it's defined as

price-fixing
noun
a practice whereby rival companies come to an illicit agreement not to sell goods or services below a certain price.

 

[bit_user]

This isn't technically price fixing since it's defined as

price-fixing
noun
a practice whereby rival companies come to an illicit agreement not to sell goods or services below a certain price.

There's at least an implicit aspect, however, wherein they judge their competitors can't/won't respond by increasing their capacity.

At best, perhaps Samsung will invest the additional profits in preparation of the coming onslaught from China. To this end, they could accelerate development of new manufacturing nodes or hasten research into new memory technologies.

If we were talking about a US company, I'm pretty sure investors would just force them to pay out the additional profits as dividends. Those investors would then dump the shares when a strong competitor appears, and the poor manufacturer (and its employees) would be left to founder.

IMO, dividends should always be taxed as income. This would dampen demand for dividend payments by investors. Otherwise, it's just bleeding out companies of their investment capital. We're always so quick to blame China for our weaknesses, but we don't look hard enough at our own shortcomings and opportunities.

 

[jimmysmitty]

What it really comes down to is the companies getting smacked by the government. As much as I am for little government intervention, lets face it they are super inefficient at things, sometimes they are useful in making companies act right.

I'm sure there's tons of government involvement in semiconductor manufacturing, on all sides. Mostly, in the form of subsidies, tax breaks, and research funding.

Probably is. However AMDs focus needs to be on CPUs and to get their GPUs into a competitive market now. Their CPUs for the first time in more than a decade for consumer and just under a decade for server are finally competitive.

GPUs are another story though. Adding RAM on top of that would pull focus away from a more profitable core business, HPC GPUs are vastly more profitable, for a market thats already over saturated with brands.