How did VIA, nVidia and SiS lose their x86 chipset licenses?

Via is still producing new x86 processors and hasn't lost any license. According to wikipedia: SiS (sold its x86 line to DM&P) so looks like it got out of the x86 business. Nvidia seems to be the same thing, most likely not profitable enough to stay in it. Whether or not they still hold the license to produce x86 processors who knows but probably not since they would have to pay for it and they aren't really interested in producing x86 processors.
 
munkle said:
Via is still producing new x86 processors and hasn't lost any license. According to wikipedia: SiS (sold its x86 line to DM&P) so looks like it got out of the x86 business. Nvidia seems to be the same thing, most likely not profitable enough to stay in it. Whether or not they still hold the license to produce x86 processors who knows but probably not since they would have to pay for it and they aren't really interested in producing x86 processors.
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Mainly this..VIA is the only other x86 CPU player, and they are only interested in making low power, embedded solutions for industry use it seems..IIRC, any company could make a "chipset" if they chose, as Nvidia used to do for both Intel and AMD..

The problem was that their offerings became sub-par compared to the in house solutions of AMD and Intel themselves, which could afford the R&D costs since they had better access to their products..
 
munkle said:
Whether or not they still hold the license to produce x86 processors who knows but probably not since they would have to pay for it and they aren't really interested in producing x86 processors.
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nvidia doesn't have (or had) a x86 license to make CPUs.
 
ccityinstaller said:
Mainly this..VIA is the only other x86 CPU player, and they are only interested in making low power, embedded solutions for industry use it seems..IIRC, any company could make a "chipset" if they chose, as Nvidia used to do for both Intel and AMD..

The problem was that their offerings became sub-par compared to the in house solutions of AMD and Intel themselves, which could afford the R&D costs since they had better access to their products..
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Nvidia's chipset license expired with Nehalem and Intel wouldn't renew it
 
VIA bought Cyrix to get their x86 license. The chipset license as others have said wasn't renewed by Intel so they are all now Intel chipsets. It doesn't really matter anymore as Intel is so far ahead in the R&D game at this point only AMD has a snowball's chance in hell to make something with anywhere near the thermals, IPC and power efficiency at the desktop/enthusiast level. I've been told steamroller could get close but without it the stagnation faced by enthusiasts will only get worse.
 
I had always hoped that nVidia would make their own CPUs, like DEC Alpha did, and compete with both Intel & AMD. I'm sure if their CPUs kicked butt the OSes would support them.
 
OFaceSIG said:
It wasn't a "transfer." More of an inheritance. Intel never granted any more x86 licenses and VIA got theirs from the purchase of Cyrix.
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Intel does not allow x86 licenses to transfer with the sale of a company.

VIA got a 10 year cross-license directly from Intel through a settlement in 2003. It was recently extended to 15 years which supposedly coincides with the expiration of Intel's Pentium 3 patents (like SSE).
 
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