Layoffs at abit

[AmberClad]

Update: Stick a fork in 'em. They're done.

Looks like it was a smart move for me not to keep waiting around for them to finally ship their IP45s. On a plus note, current abit users will be happy to know that they'll still honor RMAs and warranties for another three years.

---

Doesn't sound too good.

One has to question what the purpose to buy abit was. However since they bought abit in a bid battle between several big players, rumoured to be ECS, Foxconn and Asus, most of the original abit support and admin staff were laid off. The marketing team remained, as did the PM team with all the key engineers needed to continue making high-end to mainstream motherboards. That was in early 2006.

As of the end of July 2008, most of the Research and Development team have been laid off, and between 3-4 people from almost every engineering department from Quality Control to Field Application Engineers too. Everyone from the previous PM team who designed the likes of the MAX and Fatal1ty series that many enthusiasts grew to love have all moved on over the last year. There doesn?t seem to be much left of what was once a prosperous and productive team well worth recognition. Some of those PM members went to Biostar, and others went to Foxconn.

I wonder if this might be why it's impossible to find an abit P45 for sale anywhere, even though I know for sure I saw some prototypes back during Computex.

On a semi-related note, it looks like PCClub/ClubIT is done for good. The funding from their investor never came through .

 

[kalster]

no wonder the ip35-e has so many issues

 

[Heidfirst]

it has no more issues than any other comparable procuct from another manufacturer.
The quality of abit's hardware isn't in doubt.

 

[nerp]

My IP35-E has been one of the most stable, versatile and pleasurable to use boards I've ever owned. From the moment I took it out of the box to now it's treated me as good as a fresh criossant at a french cafe in marsailles.

 

[AmberClad]

Originally posted by: nerp
From the moment I took it out of the box to now it's treated me as good as a fresh criossant at a french cafe in marsailles.

Hot and flaky?

Sorry, I kid, I kid .

 

[jiffylube1024]

I used to be a complete ABIT junkie from the NF7-S 2.0 days (AMD Socket A) and ABIT IC7 series (Socket 478). I got an Abit NForce 4 board (the Abit AN8 Ultra, which was ahead of its time with a passively cooled heatpipe-equipped northbridge), and it had problems out of the box and required a couple BIOS updates before it really became a great board.


Lately I've found ABIT boards to be buggier than ASUS ones, and I've gone back to primarily building ASUS machines. I find ASUS updates their boards' BIOSes more regularly, and have been a bit disappointed with the downward slope ABIT appears to be on.

 

[GundamF91]

My old Abit IP35 Pro is a great board. Perfectly stable and overclocks really well. Also the uGuru chip works great too. It'll be sad if Abit can't pull through this one. They were under until Universal bought them, but now it looks things are tough again.

 

[CrystalBay]

They have been having issues for awhile /reorganized and now their going down the shitter. Sure they were at the fore front 10 or so years ago, when celerons were hot but board quality was questionable back then even.
OK now the IP35 has proven it self to be a great board , it is just not enough to compete ...

 

[Nocturnal]

Didn't a bunch of their main engineers break off and move to DFI?

 

[Dadofamunky]

That's too bad. Abit did make some good hardware from time to time. The motherboard market is pretty fragmented, though - I note Tyan is no longer an independent company either. Consolidation is a fact of life in a capitalist economy.

 

[seemingly random]

I'm not surprised considering the massive discounts on newegg.

As incongruous as it may seem, a company's financial health is not necessarily related to product quality.

 

[Jessica69]

Originally posted by: seemingly random



As incongruous as it may seem, a company's financial health is not necessarily related to product quality.

While that may be true sometimes, as a company's financial health deteriorates, cash flow starts to become a very real issue.

One way to temporarily fix, or at least improve that, is layoffs, like abit has done. Layoffs immediately improves cash flow.....but only by so much.

Another way is to make changes in how the product is made. Take motherboards.....a company has a very nicely reviewed board, but ends up having financial trouble a year later.

Layoffs happen, but the company looks for other ways to improve cash flow....so the company starts changes in how the product is made. So instead of Chemi-Con ro Rubycon caps or solid caps sourced from Japan, suddenly the boards are populated with Teapo, or Capxon caps or their solid caps are now sourced out of China instead of Japan or Taiwan.

This will also positively impact cash flow....save $4-$5 per board produced and if they're making 500K boards a month means a few million $$ saved. But will they advertise the fact they're using cheaper components? Very doubtful......and this situation is very real and happens more often than is let on.

But the consumer assumes the company continues to use the same componentry as was shown in reviews he has access to.......

That's what can happen with a company in dire financial straits......and is related directly to product quality....

 

[seemingly random]

Originally posted by: Jessica69

Originally posted by: seemingly random
As incongruous as it may seem, a company's financial health is not necessarily related to product quality.

While that may be true sometimes, as a company's financial health deteriorates, cash flow starts to become a very real issue.
...

I was alluding to the fact that even though a company may have good products, management or other factors may be problems. In this case, a while back, abit was bought out by universal which may have other priorities.

Conversely, a company can have shitty products and still make money. I'm sure everyone has examples of this.

 

[mindless1]

Originally posted by: Jessica69Another way is to make changes in how the product is made. Take motherboards.....a company has a very nicely reviewed board, but ends up having financial trouble a year later.

Layoffs happen, but the company looks for other ways to improve cash flow....so the company starts changes in how the product is made. So instead of Chemi-Con ro Rubycon caps or solid caps sourced from Japan, suddenly the boards are populated with Teapo, or Capxon caps or their solid caps are now sourced out of China instead of Japan or Taiwan.

While that is possible and does happen with some companies, Abit was still using parts like Foxconn ports, Japanese capacitors including solid ones in the CPU-VRM subsection, lots of (higher priced) Intel chipsets, and still seemingly undercutting many others with their IP35-E. Maybe that's where they had the problems, that they didn't want to cut the electronic quality but were still trying to compete with Foxconn and ECS who both are quite good at making the most out of 2 pennies and a piece of pocket lint.

 

[wizzard0003]

I've posted this in the Goodbye Abit??? thread
as well...

http://forum.uabit.com/showthread.php?t=141366

May explain what's going on, if true...

\\//_

 

[hans007]

abit was bound to fail. they are one of the smaller board manufacturers to begin with. I mean really, not unexpected.

when you have companies like asus, msi, gigabyte, foxconn, ecs making boards for every oem AND even making abits board for them to begin with (ecs has done this before) they have the real economies of scale.

so not only was abit trying to win on price, it would cost them more to build an equivalent item to begin with. its a pretty cut throat business, and i think people just dont care to pay more for whatever added value abit had, so at equivalent prices they'd lose... and now they are selling for less and losing more.

i mean the glory days of abit were when they had a differentiating feature and could compete on that. thats probably when they first had softmenu and everyone was still using jumpers. after that they were just another motherboard company. no better than any of the other small players like biostar or something. even jetway which is a small player has gone more towards niche markets like mini itx boards which get hem more money. abit did not and now they will be dead.

 

[AmberClad]

Just posted an update to this story - they're exiting the motherboard market.

 

[Heidfirst]

I think that I'll wait for official confirmation rather than what is still a rumour.

 

[Ksyder]

Originally posted by: Nocturnal
Didn't a bunch of their main engineers break off and move to DFI?

I've heard of the legendary Oskar Wu, who went to DFI from Abit a few years ago after the overclocking success of the great NF7 boards. Obviously the LanParty boards now have that honor and have for some time? I wonder if Oskar is the one responsible for this?

 

[suklee]

Wow... and I almost bought an Abit IP35-E yesterday...

 

[Ksyder]

I thought their partnership with USI was supposed to ensure their survival indefinately... perhaps they are underperforming?

edit, i feel foolish now that I've actually read the articles the OP listed. I think it would have been better if abit would have kept the same logo, etc, and tried to keep the transition as seamless as possible. It doesn't seem to make a difference but it would be nice to feel comfortable buying a quality abit board that would be competitive or better with the likes of asus, gigabyte, foxconn, etc. I guess it will be another memory of platforms' past with abit headed south. Well I haven't used Abit since the Nforce 2 days so I don't know how good their products have been. The motherboard market is somewhat confusing these days with tons of different but related chipsets on the low-end and cheap boards trying to fill a certain market niche, not to mention super expensive boards that you actually WOULD want. At least they are not using those ridiculous 40 mm or whatever fans to cool the chipsets anymore. I can see that this would be a tough time in general for motherboard makers since you've got everyone and their brother buying motherboards retail and then having to figure out compatibility issues, etc. While it is a good thing in many ways, these companies were never built to handle dealing directly with the end-user! You are lucky if you can even download drivers over speeds faster than dial up...

I pose that we place the blame on Intel for constantly releasing new and better products and driving everything downward... Damn you Intel for your great products!!

 

[gwai lo]

They just don't really have anything special to offer and their name isn't as large and marketed.

 

[Heidfirst]

Originally posted by: Kai920
Wow... and I almost bought an Abit IP35-E yesterday...

you should have grabbed it as it's a great mobo for the money & a classic.
Mind you I suspect that the IP43 (out in Europe at least) is also going to be a great mobo for the money.

 

[GundamF91]

It's too bad, I like Abit. I had IP35E and IP35Pro. Both are good board, and PRO is as good as other high end P35 boards, I'd even say it compares well against my Asus P5Q Deluxe in terms of speed and stability.

I think I'll miss them.

 

[Tweakin]

Originally posted by: kalster
no wonder the ip35-e has so many issues

I love my IP35-E...Not a single issue with it. Sure, it has some vdrop and vdroop...but I also only spent $60. I just picked up another one to build a seti cruncher. I'm sorry to see Abit go.