Taiwanese system builder Quanta Computer that builds OEM systems for among other HP, Acer and Dell have sued chip maker AMD. Quanta claims in the suit that AMD has sold circuits that has turned out to be defective due to poor heat properties.
News magazines Bloomberg reports that Quanta mentions both AMD and subsidiary ATI in the documents, something third-party sources says is related to the problems Quanta has had with the mobile Radeon family.
Quanta Computer claims AMD has violated the contract when it sold circuits that has turned out to be defective. The circuits did not meet with the specified heat properties, which caused big problems with a line of notebooks it made for NEC. The defects caused the computers to operate poorly, which hurt Quanta Computer considerably, both in potential income and profit.
Besides violating the contract Quanta claims violations of warranty, negligent misrepresentation, civil fraud and interference with a contract. Quanta Computer wants a trial with jury and damages.
AMD says it is not even manufacturing the chips anymore, which Quanta is refering to and that besides Quanta it has had no poblems reported from other partners using the same circuits. At the same time Quanta has used the circuits in other product lines without problem, something it has admitted to AMD.
“AMD disputes the allegations in Quanta’s complaint and believes they are without merit,” AMD spokesperson Michael Silverman replied in an e-mail
AMD is the world’s second largest x86 processor manufacturer and has since 2006 also made graphics circuits since the acquisition of ATI Technologies. Exactly which circuits that were pointed out as defective it doesn’t say, but it is implied to be circuits from the mobile Radeon family.
