Is the $22 billion graphics card and chip industry next on the Department of Justice’s (DoJ) antitrust radar?
The government has already taken on dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chipmakers and scored arrests, convictions, fines and prison terms based on price fixing convictions within the industry. The list of the guilty includes Korean-based Samsung and Hynix, Japan’s Elpida and Infineon of Germany.
The DoJ is also investigating possible antitrust violations in the static random access memory (SRAM) industry. Subpoenas have been issued to Sony, Samsung, Mitsubishi and Cypress Semiconductor.
Now, Nvidia (Quote) and AMD (Quote) who, between them, control virtually all of the world’s graphics cards and chip market, have joined the parade. Both companies announced last week they had received subpoenas from the DoJ related to graphics processing units and cards.
Nvidia is the market leader with approximately 53 percent of the graphics chipset market, according to Jon Peddie of Jon Peddie Research, which specializes in chips. The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based AMD, however, thanks to its July $5.4 billion cash and stock purchase of ATI Technologies, holds 47 percent of the market.
AMD arch rival Intel was one of the two customers for ATI’s graphics chipsets. With ATI under AMD’s fold, Intel could likely show preference to Nvidia, further widening the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company’s market share.
“I don’t think there’s much to this except it’s going to make lawyers richer,” Peddie told internetnews.com. “There’s lots of data on sales and we don’t see any evidence of price fixing.” Peddie said prices are very similar between AMD and Nvidia. “But the reason the prices are tightly bunched is intense competition,” he said.
Nick Aberle, an analyst with Caris & Company, agreed with Peddie. “[Price fixing allegations] are little unfounded,” he said. “We’ve done research and can’t find anything that indicates antitrust behavior. We don’t believe there is any collusion because these companies hate each other and both are throwing huge amounts of money into research and development.”
Analyst Nathan Brookwood, the founder of research firm Insight 64, said he didn’t know what the DoJ was looking for in the subpoenas but noted integrated chipmaker Intel did not receive one, possibly indicating the DoJ may be focused on “cards for medium and high end computers.”
While Intel hasn’t been subpoenaed by the DoJ, it is up to its neck in monopolist complaints alleged by AMD in civil court. AMD claims Intel unlawfully protected a monopoly in the x86 microprocessor market by shunting customers away from AMD.
According to an iSupply Corp. preliminary ranking of this year’s global top 25 semiconductor suppliers, top ranked Intel holds 12.1 percent of the world market. Samsung (7.4), Texas Instruments (5.0), Toshiba (2.9) and STMicroelectronics (3.8) round out the top five.
AMD marks a milestone in the rankings, jumping eight places to crack the top ten for the first time, racking up $7.5 billion in sales, up $3.6 billion from $3.9 billion in 2005, and making AMD the world’s seventh-largest chip maker.
AMD’s acquisition of ATI is an integral part of that growth as it focuses on combining multiple processors for what AMD calls, “general-purpose, media-centric, data-centric and graphics-centric performance.”
This article was first published on InternetNews.com. To read the full article, click here.
Ethics and Artificial Intelligence: Driving Greater Equality
FEATURE | By James Maguire,
December 16, 2020
AI vs. Machine Learning vs. Deep Learning
FEATURE | By Cynthia Harvey,
December 11, 2020
Huawei’s AI Update: Things Are Moving Faster Than We Think
FEATURE | By Rob Enderle,
December 04, 2020
Keeping Machine Learning Algorithms Honest in the ‘Ethics-First’ Era
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By Guest Author,
November 18, 2020
Key Trends in Chatbots and RPA
FEATURE | By Guest Author,
November 10, 2020
FEATURE | By Samuel Greengard,
November 05, 2020
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By Guest Author,
November 02, 2020
How Intel’s Work With Autonomous Cars Could Redefine General Purpose AI
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By Rob Enderle,
October 29, 2020
Dell Technologies World: Weaving Together Human And Machine Interaction For AI And Robotics
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By Rob Enderle,
October 23, 2020
The Super Moderator, or How IBM Project Debater Could Save Social Media
FEATURE | By Rob Enderle,
October 16, 2020
FEATURE | By Cynthia Harvey,
October 07, 2020
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By Guest Author,
October 05, 2020
CIOs Discuss the Promise of AI and Data Science
FEATURE | By Guest Author,
September 25, 2020
Microsoft Is Building An AI Product That Could Predict The Future
FEATURE | By Rob Enderle,
September 25, 2020
Top 10 Machine Learning Companies 2021
FEATURE | By Cynthia Harvey,
September 22, 2020
NVIDIA and ARM: Massively Changing The AI Landscape
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By Rob Enderle,
September 18, 2020
Continuous Intelligence: Expert Discussion [Video and Podcast]
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By James Maguire,
September 14, 2020
Artificial Intelligence: Governance and Ethics [Video]
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE | By James Maguire,
September 13, 2020
IBM Watson At The US Open: Showcasing The Power Of A Mature Enterprise-Class AI
FEATURE | By Rob Enderle,
September 11, 2020
Artificial Intelligence: Perception vs. Reality
FEATURE | By James Maguire,
September 09, 2020
Datamation is the leading industry resource for B2B data professionals and technology buyers. Datamation's focus is on providing insight into the latest trends and innovation in AI, data security, big data, and more, along with in-depth product recommendations and comparisons. More than 1.7M users gain insight and guidance from Datamation every year.
Advertise with TechnologyAdvice on Datamation and our other data and technology-focused platforms.
Advertise with Us
Property of TechnologyAdvice.
© 2025 TechnologyAdvice. All Rights Reserved
Advertiser Disclosure: Some of the products that appear on this
site are from companies from which TechnologyAdvice receives
compensation. This compensation may impact how and where products
appear on this site including, for example, the order in which
they appear. TechnologyAdvice does not include all companies
or all types of products available in the marketplace.