Tech Mergers that You Would Like to See

[DemonDragonJ]

With the recent merge of Dell and EMC, and Western Digital acquiring SanDisk, I wonder what other mergers or acquisitions may happen in the technology world, and this thread is to discuss such potential occurrences.

I am a great fan of Creative Labs, for their amazing audio products, but they are not a major presence in the technology industry, and, as such, do not have the largest of budgets. I think that an acquisition by Samsung would be very awesome, since both countries are headquartered in southeast Asia, and it would be beneficial to both of them, giving Samsung a greater variety among its products and giving Creative access to a larger budget and greater fabrication plants.

I also am a great fan of AMD, so I would rather not see them merge with or be acquired by another company, but, if they were to merge or be acquired, I would prefer that it be with Samsung, because I also am fond of that company. Samsung's solid-state drives are among the best in the world, and the idea of AMD's processors being produced by the same company does hold great appeal for me.

What does everyone else say about this? What are some mergers or acquisitions that you would like to see happen in the world of technology?

[Konrad]

I agree that the tech world would be a better place if Samsung absorbed AMD.

AMD can no longer compete with Intel's or NVidia's raw technical superiority, but AMD still manages to hold a good share of the server and processor and GPU markets (especially the low-end and mid-end markets where they often offer better bang-for-the-buck). When a gamer or an enterprise is willing to pay for maximum performance, maximum capacity, and maximum computing density then Intel+NVidia is the clear choice. But when a gamer wants the best GPU he can get for $500 or an enterprise wants the best server rack they can get for $50,000 then AMD is a far more compelling option. I've heard many people say "AMD isn't out of the race yet" over the years, so opinions differ, but my opinion is that AMD will never recover the lead and has fallen too far behind since the days when they used to leapfrog around the top tech. AMD is now utterly fabless, and also 20% owned by Siemens (and perhaps also largely owned by other companies) - they're basically just a design firm weighted down by a ton of overpaid executive bloat.

Samsung has fab. Samsung often outsources the same (TSMC) fab services that AMD uses for volume production. Samsung manufactures semiconductors and memories, indeed they've even supplied some AMD components in the past. And Samsung already has plenty of superior design talent. I think "Samsung-AMD" is a pleasant dream, but I don't think it's a realistic reality. Samsung would methodically take AMD, gut and cut it down, replace all the AMD people and tech and resources and logistics with their own, then simply use the (pseudo-)AMD brand as a mechanism to access wider appeal in the customer market. I suppose AMD has accumulated an immense pool of patents over the years, but these would all be largely obsolete - and besides, Samsung has a towering mountain of patent power already. Backed up by a ton of world-leading heavy industry and a damned good boat-making business, lol.

Imagine a world filled with "Samsung-AMD" processors, motherboards, RAM, SSDs, and GPU cards, though. Then again, Samsung is already halfway there - they're already in a good position to seriously consider x86/x64 processor and chipset offerings, they might as well design some GPUs while they're at it, and sadly they wouldn't need (or want) anything AMD currently has to offer.

[Konrad]

I will reluctantly agree that Creative is great. Except that I will never forgive Creative for murdering Gravis (one of my all-time fave tech companies, lol).

I also much mislike Acer. Cheap junk. Even their most expensive and awesome gear is as cheap and junky as possible. And I never agreed with Acer ethics - the company started off as a conglomeration of many technical assets, and many of these were the makers of Apple II clones and PC clones. (And yes, this brilliantly opportunistic and entrepreneurial past led to the invention of "vertical disintegration" in the computing market, raw piracy at first but a relentlessly driven wave of refinements and innovations and inventions ever since - and innovation is always a good thing - but today we would call Acer's founders "criminals" and I still have no respect for such an unethical and exploitive bunch of greedy capitalists.)

[Airbozo]

Not sure how much longer AMD can compete myself and I personally prefer them over Intel or nVidia. Just my personal preference. I would love to see someone with deep pockets and compatible technology gobble them up, but that might kill any x86 based processor they make, since I am pretty sure that the license they have for the x86 technology would be null and void if they were the target of an acquisition and not the buyer (i will have to check that, but I remember reading that years ago).

Creative? Meh, haven't used one of their products for many years now. Onboard graphics on the newer gaming boards is pretty good and all I really need.

The Dell EMC acquisition still has me scratching my head, only because I have worked with a lot of the companies involved. EMC bought Data Domain several years ago for their technology and at the time Data Domain was using a TON of Supermicro equipment and EMC still uses a lot of it even after the purchase by Dell. Just before the buyout, I was in their labs (which are right up the street from me) and it was still full of Supermicro servers. Dell needed something to compete in the market and EMC really was a good choice, but it will severely impact Dell's current storage offerings so I am not sure how beneficial it will be in the end. Time will tell.

Several years ago IBM bought Texas Memory Systems, because TMS has the best Flash storage product. Now many companies are producing flash storage and IBM is shoring up it's offerings to make sure they keep on top of the technology. It is becoming pretty common place now and IBM has also pushed a concerted effort to push it's software products and management tools to have a better offering of products.

HPE just completed its buyout of SGI. Not the _original_ SGI (Silicon Graphics Incorporated) we all know and love for their impressive graphics and super computers, rather what was left of SGI after they went bankrupt and Rackable Systems bought all the IP and changed their name to Silicon Graphics International.

I would love to see a company like Supermicro buy out some competitors, but that is not likely.

AMD could buy out MIPS for access to its RISC technology, but that might also cause issues with its x86 licensing from Intel.

Hmm, I will have to think about other buyouts and mergers. If the economy continues as is for a bit there will be plenty more in the coming years.

[DemonDragonJ]

Years ago, there were many companies that produced hard drives, but, they gradually merged until only Seagate and Western Digital remain, today. Currently, there are many companies that produce solid-state drives and other flash memory devices, but will that market eventually consolidate through mergers and acquisitions, as well?

[Airbozo]

Well _technically_ Hitachi, HGST (owned by WD), also makes drives and they usually are better than the others. THe reason I say _technically_ is that even though WD owns HGST, they are run as separate companies due to the fact China has never signed off on the merger.

As far as SSD's there are only a couple of foundries that make the actual silicon. What sets the SSD's apart is the controller and error correction circuitry. That market is indeed consolidating and I expect Samsung and Intel to come out on top, but SanDisk has a chance..

Flash memory is another beast that is being tamed. At one point there were about a dozen companies, but I think that is down to 4 or 5 right now. Expect a further shakeup soon.

M.2 is also a reason for the shakeup in the SSD and Flash memory sector.

NVMe is going to be the hottest storage technology in the upcoming years due to falling prices and incredible speed. That will also cause a shakeup in the storage market.

I don't think it will kill HDD's due to capacity, but it signals an upcoming end of life. Just like with tape system, the HDD will always have a place, just not as dominant.

[Konrad]

NVMe requires a PCIe slot. And for now NVMe implementations are still limited and buggy, included by motherboard vendors as add-ons, not as part of the core chipset - but I agree that it's likely to change.

NVMe drives cannot be swapped around without switching slot contents. Not really a major hassle (and fewer connectors than a SATA drive swap), but it's enough to intimidate many consumers. It's often a minor hassle because NVMe doesn't yet have a bootable standard. It's sometimes a major hassle if some sort of cryptic BIOS/driver configuration is involved, especially if the NVMe drive is where the OS resides. But again, all this is likely to change once robust NVMe "standards" evolve. It's also a hassle when other PCIe cards (or their exotic cooling systems) are disturbed, but such concerns don't affect casual users.

There's a low limit to how many NVMe drives you can install in a system. A mere handful of slots at best, even on the largest motherboard form factors. I suppose risers and extenders and adapter boards could multiply and multiplex what's allowed to get plugged onboard, but always the cost of performance - which sort of undermines the whole advantage of NVMe.

So I think SATA is going to be around for many years. It's a refined and mature technology, most core chipsets now integrated a dozen or so SATA controllers, and most motherboard makers are happy to add more and more. Plus it's really easy to move HDDs and SDDs between machines, or move whole cages full of them, or even to just leave them in place and swap connectors around.

So I think if anything renders SATA obsolete, it'll probably be USB drives. It'll be many years before a couple of SATA ports are reluctantly included simply for the sake of legacy support (like ODDs and floppy drives are these days).

[DemonDragonJ]

Intel produces CPU's; NVidia produces GPU's; AMD produces both CPU's and GPU's, so how likely is it that Intel and NVidia may join forces against AMD?

[DemonDragonJ]

Well, AMD still standing strong to this time and seems getting better and better.

Yes, it is quite amazing at how they have struck back with a vengeance with their Ryzen series of CPU's; now, there should be stronger competition in that market, which is always good for the consumers. Whenever I build my next computer, which shall likely not be for several more years, yet, I will definitely use an AMD Ryzen processor for it.