Top Two Graphic Chip Suppliers Compete to Roll Out Next-Gen Chips

Taipei, Jan. 21, 2008 (CENS)--Nvidia and AMD-ATI will introduce next-generation graphics chips in the second quarter this year. The top two graphics-chip suppliers have completed tape-out of the chips and will farm out productions of the chips to foundry supplier Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) in March.

Industry watchers pointed out that the introductions suggest life cycle of the chip has shrunk to only six months from nine months in consideration that their rollouts will come only six months after their precedents, which have just hit the market this month. The two companies' next-generation chips are developed to support dual-core processors.

AMD had been busy integrating itself with ATI throughout last year after it acquired the graphics-chip maker in 2006, giving Nvidia the chance to dethrone ATI as the world's No.1 graphics-chip supplier.

Although Nvidia introduced new chip earlier than AMD-ATI last year, the latter's 55-nm process made its RV670 chip a hot-selling product. ATI plans to introduce next-generation chip dubbed as G100 to challenge AMD-ATI's next-generation RV770.