I'm having a really hard time understanding what Nvidia is getting out of this. I could see Nvidia doing this if they were to give up on their Tegra series, but since they're not, why couldn't they just undercut MediaTek and just make lower-end Tegra parts?

Because they probably only take license fees and don't need to do any real work there? At least that's what I think.

fantaskarsef:

Because they probably only take license fees and don't need to do any real work there? At least that's what I think.

But Tegra is Nvidia doing the real work. Basically all they have to do is make a cut-down version, like they've always done with every other product they've made.

schmidtbag:

But Tegra is Nvidia doing the real work. Basically all they have to do is make a cut-down version, like they've always done with every other product they've made.

Nvidia with Tegra remembers me when Intel just sit down on their arses because anyway people would have to buy their products, i guess they are fine selling Switch chips, is not like AMD and Samsung partnership will output something.

schmidtbag:

But Tegra is Nvidia doing the real work. Basically all they have to do is make a cut-down version, like they've always done with every other product they've made.

Yes but as always, the less you are involved in the process, the less you risk. As the smartphone business, at least to some extent, took a hit during the recent years, I can imagine Nvidia doesn't even want to touch a single part of the process. Leaving it all to MediaTek in terms of true finalisation of the design, and beyond that ordering fab capacities, pre-financing the fabs and delivery to the manufacturers, etc. Also, maybe that's what Nvidia wanted to do all the time from a technical stand point, combining ARM and their GPUs, but couldn't due to their failed merger / acquisition of ARM. But I only have wild guessees to give, so you could be right anyway 😀

candy crush rt 360p dlss incoming.

schmidtbag:

I'm having a really hard time understanding what Nvidia is getting out of this. I could see Nvidia doing this if they were to give up on their Tegra series, but since they're not, why couldn't they just undercut MediaTek and just make lower-end Tegra parts?

I am going to put a tinfoil hat . Ok so now the hat is on , could it be possible that what ever joined product comes out of that venture mediatek can sell it to china like say a super fast ai arm+cuda accelerator?

Mediatek is probably after the same market Qualcomm + Samsung are trying to enter with ARM based chips for windows based devices. For ultraportable and long life devices it is the next step, and Apple has shown that it certainly can yield strong results.

A splendid move to enter restricted market at crazy competitive price level, which Nvidia couldn't do with their full business tag

Makes sense to me, Mediatek gains superior graphic capacity for their products and Nvidia makes some more money. As for Tegra, i think it`s clear that Nvidia doesn`t want to compete directly against so many other SOC makers in an already saturated market. So, they are going to "reserve" Tegra for some specific purposes and nothing else.

A splendid move indeed from both parties. Nvidia tried to purchase Arm, so that they could sell the license for the architecture to others, or perhaps investing on creating a great ARM based chip which they would sell directly to others, all propieraty technology, but since that transaction wasn't allowed, now they can offer their graphic expertise to the strongly showing company Mediatek, whose upcoming mobile chip 9200 seems truly promising - not that their recent previous chips have not been convincing. This way, Nvidia doesn't have to invest in designing strong Arm based CPUs that they could potentially waste money on, since the mobile space is furiously competed, but if Mediatek takes the risk, which they can do since they are already established distributor in that space, Nvidia can make good money by doing the GPU side. I cannot see this failing too badly, quite the opposite in fact, I expect great chips from this partnership, since I have hard time remembering when Nvidia would have failed in the mobile space, since for example, mentioned above in the comments - the Tegra line-up, has been impressive. Tegra has not gain any popularity in the smartphone, tablet and budget oriented laptop spaces though, since those devices have too strict power constraints, not enough room in the device for sufficient cooling or price is too high. Nvidia has shown, which surprised me a bit, how power efficient the current Lovelace architecture is, so power efficiency is not something they have forgot about, even if they offer monstorous flagship models likely in the future too, which the component market has allowed by offering highly ventilated cases with much space and robust power supplies, while Nvidia has invested on their own cooler design. I would like the AIBs focus more on theirs too, since they seem to only increase the size of their coolers, trusting on same proven methods of cooling, instead of trying to innovate and offer something more advanced, like Nvidia did. EDIT. clarifications