Today it was reported that EVGA is exiting the GPU business. At STH, we normally cover higher-end GPUs and CPUs. Still, at STH we have reviewed quite a few NVIDIA GPUs over the years and even had our favorite Xeon 5500/5600 motherboard in our EVGA SR-X Classified First Look. This is a big enough industry event that we are going to cover it briefly on a Friday afternoon.
EVGA Exits the GPU Business in a Split from NVIDIA
Steve at GamersNexus covers the split here:
JayzTwoCents also covers it here:
EVGA closely held the news to those two YouTube channels and organized the release of the information.
For our readers that do not want to spend the time watching 20+ minute videos, the quick summary:
- EVGA did well on the NVIDIA GeForce RTX 2000 and NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3000 series until each generation’s mining boom hurt sales and caused losses.
- EVGA felt like NVIDIA was restricting its board designs in various ways, including setting suggested sales prices.
- EVGA has somewhere around 80% of its revenue from GPU sales, but it is not its highest margin line.
- EVGA will stop selling GPUs after its current supplies run out with the RTX 3000 series, and will honor warranties. The company will continue without these NVIDIA GeForce sales.
- At this point, EVGA is not picking up AMD or Intel GPUs.
There is more to the story, but those are probably the key points.
I wanted to just provide my personal perspective here, since we deal mostly with a market segment that NVIDIA controls almost completely.
- First off, I do not think that this is going to hurt NVIDIA sales. Sales may be hurt by the Ethereum merge and mining sales, but if folks want NVIDIA GPUs, they will just buy them from another source.
- Second, I think for the consumer market, NVIDIA still needs partners. In the data center market and the high-end workstation market, chassis and systems are standardized to a degree they are not on the consumer side. As a result, I think that NVIDIA needs partners, even if they are not EVGA. NVIDIA may make a higher percentage of cards with the new generations and their FE cards. Most of the value in a consumer GPU is the chip. Other parts have some value (software, aesthetics, cooling, and more) but NVIDIA holds the key value driver in all of these products.
- Third, I think that with the end of the current mining boom, the market for consumer GPUs will contract and so having fewer players may be a consequence.
- Fourth, I wonder how much the PSU business will sag due to the loss of brand recognition if the GPU business at EVGA is shuttered.
- Fifth, and most importantly, Intel needs to buy EVGA. AMD could do well to turn EVGA to its brand, but Intel needs a strong AIB to launch a second-generation dGPU. If I were Intel’s business development team, I would first try to secure exclusive rights. If that did not work, I would find a way to purchase the business. Intel is exiting businesses, so bringing a PSU business would be questionable.
From the videos, EVGA says it is not closing up shop. My sense is it either needs to go AMD, Intel, or something more interesting like Biren transitioning into a workstation business. Shrinking a business is not great for employee morale, and EVGA’s brand has been around so long that it needs to build a business to replace it.
Final Words
I hope that something changes with this. Likely going back to NVIDIA is not the option at this point, but EVGA needs to transition its business. Intel announcing EVGA as a partner for the next generation would help that business. Still, this feels like a situation that is not at the right long-term conclusion as it has been presented today.
Our last EVGA GPU story was actually How I Got Scammed on an EVGA NVIDIA GeForce RTX 3090.
Although we still use many EVGA PSUs, it is sad to think that this will likely be the last piece that we do on an EVGA product unless something changes.
Very sad, less choices for consumers. However, consolidation in the hardware dev market is not unexpected due to the ever increasing complexity in designs
AFAICT all the Nvidia data-center GPUs are made by PNY? I assume a different contract arrangement (the margins must be way better!)
Might not hurt nvidia’s sales but I’m now more interested in AMD’s gpu offerings given how shitty a company Nvidia is, and I’m sure Im not the only one.
“Fifth, and most importantly, Intel needs to buy EVGA.”
Except that Pat’s already decided to totally kill off Intel’s consumer/gaming dedicated graphics business in the near future, so why in the HELL would they buy an EXCLUSIVELY CONSUMER FACING dGPU manufacturer??? O_o
It’s not like EVGA would be any help with future data center focused Ponte Vecchio successors… -_- … (Aka all that AXG will likely be doing going forward outside of MAYBE a single entry level Battlemage chip).
Pat’s too damn smart to continue yeeeeeears of RIDICULOUSLY LARGE losses trying to enter the consumer GPU market in literally its absolute weakest point in DECADES and with no end to that in site.
Nvidia obviously couldn’t disclose the pricing for the 4000 series to EVGA. My guess is that it is going to be the biggest increase in price per bitness in nvidia’s history. Look at it this way, the wafer pricing jump from samsung 8nm to TSMC 4N is probably double due to density increase. so a 600MM^2 4000 series 384bit chip would cost anywhere between 900-1200 dollars to produce(assuming TSMC 4N is $1.5-$2 per MM^2). Compared to the wafer agreement with Samsung 8nm(much less than $.80 per MM^2). So even if 4000 series is twice as fast as the 3000 series, it would be a flat or even regression in terms of performance per dollar. Is 4070 going to be a 192bit chip? I mean AMD’s bitness creep in the last generation is already disgusting, calling a 128Bit chip 6600XT to fight 3060 which is a 192bit chip. Nvidia is just doing the same bitness creep just because TSMC 4N is not cheap.
In other words, the people who are dumping GPUs these days expecting the 4000 series offering twice the performance are going to be disappointed to find out that 4000 series will be nearly twice as expensive. And the TSMC process upgrade is taking away all the performance and value increase per dollar
EVGA is not for sale and maybe they can expand their Motherboard offerings. But the FTC and The US Justice Department’s Antitrust division needs to have a look at GPU Price Fixing in the AIB Partner market place. I’d think that the GPU market is contracting to the greater degree with the Ethereum Merge and the Governments cracking down of that energy intensive form of Coin mining so EVGA has little to lose there in withdrawing from the GPU Market Place so little is the Margins from video card sales.
There are two sides to every story. Having worked this industry for decades neither partner is squeaky clean. Andrew Han built a very big business and got rich with Nvidia GPUs, but like a lot of us he got tired of eating sh*t sandwiches. Can’t blame him. Nvidia is a master at monopolizing every drop of value in their GPUs.
The part of the story nearly left out (except for one tiny passing mention in the GamersNexus vid) was the idea of “leaks.” Nvidia’s AIB partners get treated like second class citizens because they do the bare minimum to maintain partnerships, in EVGA’s case, with a supplier responsible for 80% of his revenue. Andrew thinks is disrespectful to learn MSRP at the moment of announcement, Jensen finds it disrespectful his NDA materials get out to the media before launch. Such is life.
Andrew Han is a rich man, I wouldn’t cry any tears for him. He’s also a smart guy with good relationships. He’s got the resources he needs to figure out the next move. The idea he doesn’t want anything to do with AMD or Intel should be telling.
@Y0s, i believe both PNY and Nvidia FE are manufactured by Palit, with PNY being the sole retail distributor of the quadros and other cards.
IDK, Patrick. AMD has never shown any ability with retail, and Intel does not appear to have a competitive GPU. Biren’s GPU looks like compute not gaming. Can’t see why any should buy EVGA.
Intel maybe because otherwise it likely has to pay AIBs to make cards with it’s GPUs. But what AIB wants to tie its name to second tier videocards? No sex appeal.
Are margins so bad with video cards that AMD is not an option? To many ppl “EVGA” means video cards.
OK lets be practical. EVGA leadership are smart people to manage an international company for this long. Likely their Internal Business Review concluded that they needed to cut low margin sales lines (even those with high volume/revenue). IBR for 2022 likely showed low margin and forward looking IBR showed maybe a worse projection in years ahead including no improvement in their AIB relationship with NVIDIA. OK and they will lose $ on their current stock, too.
Patrick, Nexus & JTC & other blog folks have hit it on the head.
1. Other Coin mining will continue to “Merge”. That will negatively impact everyone’s retail sales. OEM’s NVIDIA, AIBs, Retail resellers, etc.
2. Low cost Previously Owned (aka used) GPU’s are already available at reduced prices. This will continue and is a direct Negative Impact & Price Competition for New GPU Cards.
3. Likely (70% Probable?) worldwide recession & lingering high inflation will change spending habits from “Wants” to “Needs”. Needs – Non-discretionary spending: Food, Shelter, Fuel, Utilities, etc. Wants: I want that new NVIDIA GPU 4000 series card. But I will just keep my MSI 3060RTX & EVGA 1650 GPU Cards for a while.
Who knows we may look back & see that EVGA lead the pack and made a great decision and other AIB’s, retailers, etc. may follow suit in this or other similar business sales lines. Best of luck to all.
led the pack
The graphs showing nVidia internal profit margin on a GPU vs. 3rd party profit margin on a GPU over time are insane.
https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/09/evgagraph.png
I think that’s the part that isn’t highlighted enough.