Intel plans to ship at least 4 million ARC Alchemist graphics cards in 2022. But, you already knew that, didn’t you? Here’s something that actually raises eyebrows. For these 4 million GPUs, Intel only expects to earn 0 million in revenue, and the rest going to intra-company royalties. (Modafinil) In a nutshell, the average selling price (ASP) of the 1st Gen ARC graphics cards will be a modest $75. That’s half as much as the MSRP of the GeForce GTX 1650, and a third of its present market price.
In reality, Intel expects to ship 4 million GPU units, but only earn $300M revenue on it with the rest being intra company royalties that are just made up?
Is Intel just selling low-end GPUs to get market share?
They have 2 dies which they will sell, and the smaller of the two is only 128 execution units. For reference, the last generation Tiger Lake integrated GPU was 96 execution units, and next-generation Meteor Lake goes up to 192 execution units. The vast majority of Intel’s GPU volume will sell into the market at ~$75 or fewer ASPs and offer worse performance than AMD’s integrated graphics and worse than Intel’s next-generation iGPU as well.
This makes us wonder whether the bulk of Intel’s discrete graphics cards will come in the form of the 128 EU units aimed at integrated graphics solutions. AMD’s newly launched Ryzen 9 6900HS featuring the RDNA 2 iGPU should have no trouble destroying these “dGPUs”.
It’s also highly likely that Intel is offering OEMs large-scale discounts for coupling its Alder Lake-P processors with the Arc Alchemist mobile graphics processors to boost reach. There are rumors of a post-sales payment model wherein the vendors will pay for the GPUs only after the notebooks are sold. Overall, Intel seems willing to fight dirty to grab a slice of the discrete graphics card market, and considering the state of the market, it’s only fair.
Processors, PC gaming, and the past. I have written about computer hardware for over seven years with over 5000 published articles. I started during engineering college and haven't stopped since. On the side, I play RPGs like Baldur's Gate, Dragon Age, Mass Effect, Divinity, and Fallout. Contact: areejs12@hardwaretimes.com.
