ATI has been synonymous with two things, red and graphics cards. When ATI was acquired by AMD in 2006 the naming of the company cards become a bit fuzzy even if the brand ATI lived on. AMD has now decided that he time has come for ATI to retire to finally gather all products under AMD.
AMD started a large reorganization of its products for the mobile market in 2009 with the introduction of VISION. When it now closes in on its first new processor architecture in many years it decided to revise its entire product portfolio and makes a seldom seen Fall cleaning.
The most expected news is that AMD will remove the ATI brand. AMD says that its own surveys that many consumers and users relate the company graphics products with AMD Radeon instead of ATI Radeon.
From these studies it has concluded that the market is ready, or may even prefer, all products under one brand, AMD.
The study was done with well aware users and it showed that ATI had lost its strength as a brand, which AMD sees as a good moment to tailor its product categories.
ATI Radeon will from 2011 be replaced by AMD Radeon, while ATI FirePro will become AMD FirePro. The first products that will be named AMD Radeon will be the second generation DirectX 11 graphics circuits that launches in Q4 2010, which means that Northern Islands will be dubbed AMD Radeon HD 6000.
AMD will launch two setups of logotypes where PC builders and partners get to pick which one to use. AMD did not specify when either logo could be used, but it’s rather obvious when you look at them.
AMD’s new logotypes for graphics products
Computers with a complete AMD platform will carry the AMD Radeon Graphics logotype, while computers with e.g. Intel processor and AMD graphics circuits will carry logotypes that mention only Radeon or FirePro Graphics. This should make them more neutral to rival Intel.
AMD opens doors for companies scared of angering Intel
AMD decided to reveal an unexpected change with its processor branding. AMD have been using the names Athlon, Sempron and Phenom for some time, but with the first Fusion APU circuits around the corner, AMD says its time to move on, not just with how we look at our processors, but also locate them.
AMD VISION will be the brand to be used with the Fusion circuits, which means that previous processor series will simply be phased out from the market when AMD enters the next processor generation.
On the mobile market it has Ontario that launches in Q4 2010 and Llano to bring the APU concept to desktops in 2011. These processor series will launch as VISION.
The exact product naming schemes and how AMD will separate mobile, desktop or for that matter different price ranges remains to be seen. The idea is to continue marketing products, but not with specific names but what they can do and have been developed for, a way of thinking it introduced with AMD VISION for the mobile market, which has worked very well there and enabled it to grab a large market share from Intel .
AMD VISION as it was divided on the mobile market,
A possible hint of what to come for desktops
How this transfers over to the desktop market is uncertain, but what is certain is that VISION is AMD’s future and beside its own company logotype it’s only the Opteron platform that will live on as before.
The reason AMD is reorganizing is without a doubt because of the coming Fusion family of APU circuits. At the same time AMD feels confident ever since Intel got on the wrong side of FTC for its anticompetitive tactics.
A years ago there would have been few PC builders that would have dared, or been allowed to, use AMD stickers on their Intel computers.
It’s sad to see ATI Technologies disappear into AMD, but as long as the company continues down the same path and keeps developing powerful graphics circuits we are prepared to forgive it. If AMD can come up with a good scheme for the VISION brand we can only consider this a positive change, especially for the uninitiated users. The real test will come with Llano and Bulldozer in the latter half of 2011 when the stationary platform will be restructured.
AMD strips down the number of brands in 2011
