NVIDIA strikes back against Intel
GPU maker NVIDIA has fired back a countersuit against Intel in response to Intel's suit to block NVIDIA from making controller chips for future generations of Intel's processors.
NVIDIA's complaint says the two companies have "met and attempted to resolve this dispute and have participated in a private mediation process." However, the matter still has not been resolved, despite what NVIDIA described as diligent efforts to come to an agreement with Intel in 2008.
Intel is insisting that its existing agreement with NVIDIA does not apply to its next generation Nehalem CPUs, the same chips Apple is now using in the new Mac Pro. This prevents NVIDIA from making a compatible chipset Apple can use in Macs based on the new processor.
Apple shifted from using Intel's support chipsets to NVIDIA last year in the unibody MacBooks, and migrated the rest of its consumer offerings, including the iMac and Mac mini, to the same NVIDIA control chip last month. Without a future roadmap for NVIDIA control chips, Apple may have to reconsider its existing strategies, which heavily leverage GPU technology with the NVIDIA-supported OpenCL.
The NVIDIA countersuit
NVIDIA maintains in its countersuit claims that "Intel has manufactured this licensing dispute as part of a calculated strategy to eliminate NVIDIA as a competitive threat."
"For years," NVIDIA's complaint states, "Intel has dominated the lucrative field of central processing units, with Intel's graphics offering being an afterthought. NVIDIA, in contrast, correctly predicted that graphics processing would become increasingly important to computer technology and pioneered sophisticated graphics products, including innovative new graphics processing units."
NVIDIA says that "after years of dominating the computer processing space, Intel found it self needing to play catch-up to NVIDIA's pioneering graphics processing technology," which resulted in Intel licensing NVIDIA's "entire patent portfolio" in 2004, in exchange for granting NVIDIA "a broad, long-term license to make chipsets for Intel's CPUs."
"Unable to compete on the merits," NVIDIA says, "Intel is now using this lawsuit to tilt the playing field decidedly in its favor." The complaint says Intel has not only blocked NVIDIA from competing by seeking to add arbitrary new exclusions to their existing agreement (specifically blocking NVIDIA from creating chipsets for CPUs that include a memory controller, as Nehalem CPUs do), but has also damaged NVIDIA's business by publicly announcing that it believes NVIDIA is not licensed to build chipsets for future Intel CPUs.
NVIDIA claims that sales of its "undisputedly licensed MCPs [control chips] to current Intel architectures are also being affected as Intel uses its public disavowal of the license to alarm customers into believing that NVIDIA's chipsets will soon be unusable with Intel platforms."
The complaint asks that Intel's rights to NVIDIA's patent portfolio under the cross license "be terminated in their entirety," depriving Intel of using NVIDIA's graphics technology as long as it blocks NVIDIA's ability to build licensed versions of chipsets compatible with Intel's latest CPUs.
NVIDIA's complaint says the two companies have "met and attempted to resolve this dispute and have participated in a private mediation process." However, the matter still has not been resolved, despite what NVIDIA described as diligent efforts to come to an agreement with Intel in 2008.
Intel is insisting that its existing agreement with NVIDIA does not apply to its next generation Nehalem CPUs, the same chips Apple is now using in the new Mac Pro. This prevents NVIDIA from making a compatible chipset Apple can use in Macs based on the new processor.
Apple shifted from using Intel's support chipsets to NVIDIA last year in the unibody MacBooks, and migrated the rest of its consumer offerings, including the iMac and Mac mini, to the same NVIDIA control chip last month. Without a future roadmap for NVIDIA control chips, Apple may have to reconsider its existing strategies, which heavily leverage GPU technology with the NVIDIA-supported OpenCL.
The NVIDIA countersuit
NVIDIA maintains in its countersuit claims that "Intel has manufactured this licensing dispute as part of a calculated strategy to eliminate NVIDIA as a competitive threat."
"For years," NVIDIA's complaint states, "Intel has dominated the lucrative field of central processing units, with Intel's graphics offering being an afterthought. NVIDIA, in contrast, correctly predicted that graphics processing would become increasingly important to computer technology and pioneered sophisticated graphics products, including innovative new graphics processing units."
NVIDIA says that "after years of dominating the computer processing space, Intel found it self needing to play catch-up to NVIDIA's pioneering graphics processing technology," which resulted in Intel licensing NVIDIA's "entire patent portfolio" in 2004, in exchange for granting NVIDIA "a broad, long-term license to make chipsets for Intel's CPUs."
"Unable to compete on the merits," NVIDIA says, "Intel is now using this lawsuit to tilt the playing field decidedly in its favor." The complaint says Intel has not only blocked NVIDIA from competing by seeking to add arbitrary new exclusions to their existing agreement (specifically blocking NVIDIA from creating chipsets for CPUs that include a memory controller, as Nehalem CPUs do), but has also damaged NVIDIA's business by publicly announcing that it believes NVIDIA is not licensed to build chipsets for future Intel CPUs.
NVIDIA claims that sales of its "undisputedly licensed MCPs [control chips] to current Intel architectures are also being affected as Intel uses its public disavowal of the license to alarm customers into believing that NVIDIA's chipsets will soon be unusable with Intel platforms."
The complaint asks that Intel's rights to NVIDIA's patent portfolio under the cross license "be terminated in their entirety," depriving Intel of using NVIDIA's graphics technology as long as it blocks NVIDIA's ability to build licensed versions of chipsets compatible with Intel's latest CPUs.
Comments
just too big to get away with cherry picking what vendors get to license their technology.
I'm sure they're smarting because Nvidia ate their Mac chipset lunch but it's their fault for shipping asstastic GMA graphics. They need to compete better.
Personally I wasn't sure how Nvidia would do on a large scale as the chipset provider but other than the soldering glitch in some Macbooks they've been solid though they need to get with Apple and improve the graphics drivers in the 9400/9600 stuff. They're not benching as fast as I'd like to see.
I want to see what Nvidia can do with Nehalem.
Also... I can't believe NVIDIA would license their patent portfolio to Intel but I guess you do whatever you have to in order to get your foot in the door. Too bad...Intel now has the blueprints and you don't have to infringe on a patent in order to get a lot of good ideas.
Jen-Hsun Huang on Charlie Rose:
http://www.charlierose.com/view/interview/10060
So, basically, Intel is being greedy and/or NVIDIA is being cheap. Either way, we'll have to pay for it.
-mark
I just can't see any good coming out of this conflict for Intel win or loose.
Dave
This reminds me of the "browser wars". Just like
Also... I can't believe NVIDIA would license their patent portfolio to Intel but I guess you do whatever you have to in order to get your foot in the door. Too bad...Intel now has the blueprints and you don't have to infringe on a patent in order to get a lot of good ideas.
Actually all patents are published into the public domain when the patent is granted. The protection that patents afford is that non-licensed companies are not allowed to use them for the period of time that the patent is in force. This is the trade off a company must make when seeking patent protection. Companies can keep ideas secret and try to use trade secrecy laws to keep others from using those ideas, but this is much more difficult and does not preclude others from "developing" the same idea independently and then using them.
of under $6B, so a hostile takeover would be doable. Whether it is a good
idea for either company or for consumers is another question.
We won't really see the effect of the move until 2010 when the mobile chips move to the new architecture. Then Nvidia won't be able to supply integrated graphics solutions. By then, Intel's Larrabee will be in production though so it may not matter from a consumer perspective if they deliver decent performance.
The move is still a fairly anti-competitive one and I would hope Nvidia win the case. I don't see a merger/buyout between Intel and Nvidia.
Actually all patents are published into the public domain when the patent is granted. The protection that patents afford is that non-licensed companies are not allowed to use them for the period of time that the patent is in force. This is the trade off a company must make when seeking patent protection.
You are absolutely right but I was (probably mistakenly) under the impression, from other articles, that there was also some private domain info exchanged in the deal.
This isn't primarily about GPUs but chipsets. You can get Nvidia GPUs with the current Mac Pro but it's not an Nvidia motherboard. Therefore, Intel aren't stopping people getting good graphics performance. It would be a stupid move to restrict GPU usage because people would be supporting AMD instead.
We won't really see the effect of the move until 2010 when the mobile chips move to the new architecture. Then Nvidia won't be able to supply integrated graphics solutions. By then, Intel's Larrabee will be in production though so it may not matter from a consumer perspective if they deliver decent performance.
The move is still a fairly anti-competitive one and I would hope Nvidia win the case. I don't see a merger/buyout between Intel and Nvidia.
Larrabee is a discrete GPU. In any case, due to the integration of the memory controller to the CPU, it's no longer possible to produce a GPU integrated to the chipset with reasonable performance. nVidia should focus on producing low-cost, more energy-efficient GPUs instead.
I hope this doesn't hose Apple's Grand Central/Open CL plans.
They could simply include discrete graphics on all their products. Their premium price point cannot justify the use of Intel integrated graphics.
So, basically, Intel is being greedy and/or NVIDIA is being cheap. Either way, we'll have to pay for it.
-mark
Really, its Intel trying to get fees, and NVIDIA saying they've already "paid" them by offering their IP under the previous agreement. NVIDIA, I assume, entered that agreement under the assumption that they would have chipset rights to all future processors. Intel probably included memory controller in their definition of chipset. By integrating the memory controller with the processor, Intel is not trying to use what's essentially a loophole to say they only allowed chipset w/ a memory controller and that a chipset w/o one is not covered in the agreement. If NVIDIA was never informed that Intel planned for this combination in their future processors, then they should win the case. If they knew that Intel was planning this change, then they should have hired better lawyers to bring up such a possibility.
Anywho, I totally agree that Intel is being vindictive b/c NVIDIA is now the star of Mac-town. Wonder if Apple brass are talking w/ AMD at all while this plays itself out?
I wonder what your guys thoughts are on this? I like AMD. They are the underdog and would welcome Apple and bend to Apple's needs to compete with Intel.
I wish Apple would lean on Intel and threatem them to work with AMD in the future. I was hoping Apple would make a deal with AMD instead of with Intel. If Apple would team up with Nvidia and AMD to compete with WinTel machines, we would have a nice competition going on, which will hurt Microsoft and Intel's dominant position. Microsoft is already felling the pain of Apple gaining ground on them.
I wonder what your guys thoughts are on this? I like AMD. They are the underdog and would welcome Apple and bend to Apple's needs to compete with Intel.
That would work if Apple had more than 10% of the market share.
You can't tell me that this wasn't skillfully planned by MS and Intel.
With Windows 7 coming they see Apple as the same little spoiled kids you were in the 80's.
Go with the Market Share and let Apple sink.
You are paying for a logo. Same parts as a PC, made in China (look at the Mac track record lately on all brands including the iPhone (unstable). And you can build one from parts from Radio Shack. Look at Psystar they are doing it and Apple has yet to answer.
Apple is the Vista of the last 7 years.
That would work if Apple had more than 10% of the market share.
You can't tell me that this wasn't skillfully planned by MS and Intel.
With Windows 7 coming they see Apple as the same little spoiled kids you were in the 80's.
Go with the Market Share and let Apple sink.
You are paying for a logo. Same parts as a PC, made in China (look at the Mac track record lately on all brands including the iPhone (unstable). And you can build one from parts from Radio Shack. Look at Psystar they are doing it and Apple has yet to answer.
Apple is the Vista of the last 7 years.
This literally made me laugh out loud. Thanks, I needed that.
This literally made me laugh out loud. Thanks, I needed that.
Laugh all the way to the bank for your next Mac. I'll just use my ATM Card to purchase the same machine without the logo on it.
NAME ONE PART IN YOUR MAC THAT CAN'T BE PURCHASED OFF THE SHELF.
THE BATTERY.
WHEN YOU ARE READY TO UPGRADE YOUR 15" POUR BOOK GET READY TO SHELL OUT $1,200 TO GET 8GB OF RAM.