NVIDIA takes rare loss on faulty chips, competition
updated 01:25 pm EDT, Wed August 13, 2008
NVIDIA loses on bad chips
Graphics chip builder NVIDIA has reported its first quarterly loss in almost five years, writes the Wall Street Journal. The company has taken a net loss of $120.9 million for its second financial quarter, admitting that materials used to package its mobile graphics chips caused unusually high failure rates. Third-party observers have suggested that the company's desktop processors could be affected as well, but this allegation has not been confirmed.
Chip failures could be responsible for an error with Apple's MacBook Pro, in which the display goes black but every other component keeps running.
NVIDIA's loss is also attributed to competition from AMD, whose Radeon HD 4850 and 4870 cards have delivered performance equivalent to NVIDIA GTX cards, but at lower costs. NVIDIA was forced to lower its own prices to remain in the market.
