July Industry Update

VIA Chipsets

In addition to the July 6 settlement agreement between VIA and Intel for the P5 and P6 chipsets, there is a rumor that VIA is designing a P7 chipset, and may be seeking a license to manufacture that as well. Industry experts are estimating that Taiwanese manufacturers will produce at least 22M Intel chipsets in the 2nd half of 2000 (over 3.5M per month), with the majority being made by VIA.

The Apollo Pro133 chipset (693A) is still very popular, outselling the more recent Pro133A (694x) chipset by a margin of 4-to-1 according to some motherboard manufacturers. Overall, most motherboard manufacturers are indicating that VIA based boards comprise from 50% to 70% of their shipments.

While VIA had hoped for a flawless introduction of the KT133 chipset (Socket A), the first run had some problems with memory timings when 3 DIMM slots were populated. This has been corrected in their second run, but has also caused some manufacturers to hold back on motherboard production. AMD had reportedly requested 500K chipset for June, but there are reports that the number was more likely 300K or less. July estimates indicate that VIA will again shoot for 500K units shipped. Manufacturers are reporting that chipset prices are beginning to rise as VIA appears to have begun taking advantage of their market position. No longer having to fight for market share and market recognition, prices have stabilized and may even begin to rise slightly. In fact, VIA has indicated that they are able to ship virtually every chipset produced and still have order backlogs. Recently, it was reported that VIA purchased some capacity from Hyundai to help meet demand.

In response to the announcements made by Rambus regarding the Toshiba and Hitachi settlements, VIA reiterated support for DDR. A spokesperson for VIA indicated that efforts have been redoubled on the KX266 chipset, and they believe it might be ready for a late Q3 release.