ECS is one of the biggest manufacturers on a market that is growing tougher and tougher. The competition has increased and we’ve seen the results from this in the joint venture between ASUS and Gigabyte and now MSI is thinking of doing something similar. According to ECS VP David Liu we should be able to expect that the hard climate on the motherboard market will reduce the number of actors and the question is how manufacturers there will be left in a few years, Liu answered about five. By manufacturer he specifically means “manufacturers” and we may very well see more motherboard brands.
“Though, it is possible that there are more brands on the market than actual companies, implying cases similar to Abit, which is produced by Universal Scientific; Asrock, which is a subsidiary of Asustek Computer and Gigabyte United, which is a joint-venture by Asus and Gigabyte.”
How this will affect the PC market and the consumers is hard to say. But as long as the competition remains tough we will see many new and exciting motherboards. Hopefully not the same boards with different names, but a broader variation.
