Quote from: iCEBREAKER on August 05, 2013, 06:06:07 AM

Quote from: TheSwede75 on August 05, 2013, 04:33:08 AM

I have to 100% agree with the people being really sceptic of the Avalon $200 mil investment effecting short/medium term ASIC. 20 nm is FAR away to be produced in anything even close to volume. Sure, it will be an impressive next-gen tech, bit it will be late 2014 before anyone sees it in action. Plenary of time for the rest of the Eco system to be very profitable for a long time.

Basically the $200 million investment is GREAT for Bitcoin legitimacy etc. but n
Has no short/medium term effect on any of the current projects.

Lots of derisive, dismissive discussion about Lewis' disruptive $200 million Avalon investment ^here^ and in other posts.

It sure is easy to pat ourselves on the back and scoff at their ambitious, bleeding-edge 20nm roadmap.

Much less mentioned among the JV cheerleader crew is Cointerra's impending angel-funded full-custom 28nm chip.

Do you hear that creaking noise? That's the sound of our popsicle stand's plastic and particle board supports being crushed by Cointerra's tank treads.

Whistling past the graveyard isn't going to help us avoid being obsolete before Christmas.

I predict a wave of bankruptcies, consolidation/aquisitions, and mergers in the ASIC space as human/financial capital requirements to stay competitive begin overwhelming the garage inventor outfits.

That's right... keep spreading FUD so you can buy more cheap shares to flip once the price recovers. Even AMD and NVIDIA are not producing 20nm chips yet and they are huge semiconductor companies with billions of dollars that usually keep TSMC and other companies busy.

NVIDIA gave a presentation in late 2011 explaining the problems of moving to 20nm including high costs for little performance gain. http://www.extremetech.com/computing/123529-nvidia-deeply-unhappy-with-tsmc-claims-22nm-essentially-worthless

20nm is going to cost significantly more than 28nm for at least a couple years based on NVIDIA's projections here, and the production lines will be busy fulfilling orders for these semiconductor giants, not a tiny company like Avalon regardless of whether or not they receive this alleged $200 M investment. Avalon's 20nm chips would be at least one year away if not more; they would be absurdly expensive and they would not be able to compete on price with the 3 contenders for the 28nm market who will have much lower NRE and R&D costs as well as getting to market faster.

From the article: "What this slide states we cant even call it a suggestion is that smaller processes no longer improve yields by leading to a greater number of chips per wafer. Instead, the complexities and difficulties of manufacturing at the new process create a cost structure that provides precious little incentive to manufacture at the new process. "