> Investing in Linux (mostly), plus a few other open source technologies > is highly profitable to IBM, because it helps them sell hardware. But > would they consider it to be profitable to invest in another graphics > chip? They already have some of their own. >
That's a good question. Is a FPGA more expensive to produce than a dedicated chip? If IBM where to use the OGP in e.g. their servers, the production prize would properly be an importnat factor. > Also, how would the community feel about the degree of corporate > control that IBM would inevitably try to wield over it? If I were > them, I would want to make sure my investment didn't get away from me. > But what they want and what everyone else wants may not be the same. > Yes, it could be a great opportunity to them, but would they see it > that way? I guess it depends on, if they have a need for it... Do they make other hardware than servers? > At full production, Traversal could make millions/year from > OGP-related products. Is IBM going to care about a few million/year, > when they usually try to invest in things that make billions? I think they would. The PR that the hardware itsself is Open Source have a value too. I could see a banner saying "IBM going all the way." =) > That's a charity amount, although even a small amount could be a great > PR move for them. PR is a good thing, especially when it comes to > OSS. :) So asking for $x with no strings attached could be of great interest at this time? > Again, large volumes to us are small volumes to them. However, I > wouldn't be surprised if they gave us a deep discount on production. > So say it cost only 1 million to produce the 100k quantity. We still > have to get what, to us, is a huge amount of money. Is $x or producing the proto type/final equally good? I have come to think of an article I once read about AMD, where they told that setting up the prodution for a new chip is the most expensive part. Does anyone have experince on costs of manufacturing FPGA's and PCB's? > IBM, like any good business, believes in what's good for business. > Trust me. They're not into open source on principle. [snip] > Businesses are often slow to adapt, huge ones especially. IBM wasn't. > I tend to forget/(didn't knew) that it always ends down to money. >>What if IBM offered to help on the design instead of giving money? Would that >>be of interest? > > Maybe. What would they help with? Could it be, that they hold patents for algorithms for the GPU that could be of interst if they licenced them in the way Linus demands licenses from IBM? Could it be of interest to get their source codes for their graphics drivers? Or perhaps the diagrams for their graphics cards? Martin _______________________________________________ Open-graphics mailing list [email protected] http://lists.duskglow.com/mailman/listinfo/open-graphics List service provided by Duskglow Consulting, LLC (www.duskglow.com)
