R and D does not make a major player. Marketshare does. Having your own Fabs to not make you a major player. Nvidia shows that as well as AMD.I was referring to marketshare rather than capability with respect to NVIDIA. Looking at raw numbers, NVIDIA invests far more into R&D than AMD does and they have a stranglehold on the GPU market. Navi hasn't really made a huge dent. But as far as Intel goes, the foundry ability will always give them an edge in enterprise. They may have shortages now but that won't last.
-can AMD affect pricing of the competitors? yes
-can AMD affect the product Stacks of their competitors? yes
-can AMD ship products in volume? yes
These facts on how AMD can manipulate the market makes them a major player in both CPUs and GPUs - whether you like it or not.