SANTA CLARA, Calif., Oct 24 (Reuters) - Nvidia Corp. is confident it can stay independent despite the recent takeover of its main rival, and it sees big growth opportunities in areas such as mobile, where it expects sales to double annually, executives said on Tuesday.
Nvidia has been the target of merger speculation since Advanced Micro Devices Inc., the No. 2 maker of computer processors, announced it would buy Canadian graphics chip maker ATI Technologies Inc. for $5.6 billion.
Some analysts
Some analysts have suggested Nvidia could end up being bought by No. 1 chip maker Intel Corp., or at least being forced to strike some sort of in-depth partnership like a licensing deal.
Mike Hara, Nvidia's vice president of investor relations, reiterated his company's determination to stay independent.
"It reinforces our philosophy that we don't want to be tied up," Hara told Reuters when asked about the ATI deal.
"I don't think anything changes. In fact, what we've already felt and seen I think gives us the energy to push faster. While AMD and ATI figure out what their FUTURE looks like, we know what ours looks like," Hara said.
Nvidia and ATI are also big suppliers of chipsets—the collection of secondary chips and INTERFACES that sit next to a PC's main processor. AMD gets about half its chipsets from Nvidia, and both companies say they expect that relationship to continue even after ATI is folded into its new parent.
Hara said AMD and Intel, which are battling it out for supremacy in the PC processor market, still need Nvidia as much as ever.
"We've become the necessary evil for both companies because they can't compete with each other using their own technologies," Hara said.
With sales of $2.4 billion last year, Nvidia has been trying to expand beyond its core desktop computer market, and has its eye on the fast-growing market for mobile devices, which is dominated by ATI.
The Santa Clara, California-based company expects sales of its graphics and video chips for mobile phones to double this year to more than $100 million, and believes it can maintain that pace for several years, another executive said.
"Last year we did $55 million, this year we'll double that, and as far out as I can see we'll continue to double that," said Michael Rayfield, general manager of Nvidia's wireless media processor business.
"I can see out toward north of a billion (dollars) by that doubling process," Rayfield told Reuters in an interview.
The total market for such mobile chips is expected to reach $7 billion in 2011, compared with less than $1 billion now, Rayfield said. 8-)
umm... i wonder when ms is goingto try to start buying things?? lolThey own all of them already. What MS don't own and can't buy, they steal. therer trying to still my soulQuote

therer trying to still my soul

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therer trying to still my soul

Well put.

just cuz i cant spell right dont mean you guys have to pick onn me...

lol i no

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lol i no

LOL. I know.