Graphic Processor Unit (GPU) shipment was up 3.2 percent during the second quarter of 2014 compared to the previous quarter, says a new report from Jon Peddie Research (JPR).
The big drop in graphics shipments in Q1 has been partially offset by a small rise this quarter, the research said.
The research estimates total shipments of graphics chips in 2017 will be 418 million units. In 2013, 438.3 million GPUs were shipped and the forecast for 2014 is 414.2 million.
Intel leads the market with 67.3 percent market share, followed by AMD and Nvidia at 17.9 percent and 14.7 percent respectively.
AMD’s shipment for the quarter jumps 11 percent, whereas Intel’s total shipments increased 4 percent from last quarter, and Nvidia’s decreased 8.3 percent.
Graphics chips have become an essential tech component today, the research said. Graphics chips (GPUs) and chips with graphics (IGPs, APUs, and EPGs) are a leading indicator for the PC market.
More significantly, the technology is entering new market segments like supercomputers, remote workstations and simulators on a daily basis.
Several new technologies and compute programs are taking advantage of the ability of GPU power to scale.
Gaming PC market continues to build momentum, giving boost to the GPU market. Gaming PC segment, where higher-end GPUs are used, was a bright spot in the market in Q1. Nvidia and AMD high-end GPUs sales were strong, lifting the ASPs for the discrete GPU market.
The attach rate of GPUs (includes integrated and discrete GPUs) to PCs, for the quarter was 139 percent (up 3.2 percent) and 32 percent of PCs had discrete GPUs, (down 3.6 percent) which mean 68 percent of the PCs are using the embedded graphics in the CPU.
The overall PC market increased 1.3 percent quarter-to-quarter, and decreased 1.7 percent year-to-year.
Desktop graphics add-in boards (AIBs) that use discrete GPUs declined 17.5 percent.
According to JPR, the abnormal spike happened in 2009 after the massive market decline warps the 10-year average to 7.1 percent and makes the 3.2 percent this year appear to be below average. If the anomalous 2009 spike is ignored, the 9 year average is just 0.5 percent, which would make the 3.2 percent increase for Q2 2014 a significant increase.
Q2 2014 saw the first decline in tablet sales, and one of the few increases in PC sales. The CAGR for total PC graphics from 2014 to 2017 is basically flat.
AMD’s shipments of desktop heterogeneous GPU/CPUs, i.e., APUs increased 16.7 percent from the previous quarter, and increased 10.3 percent in notebooks. AMD’s discrete desktop shipments decreased 10.7 percent and notebook discrete shipments increased 30.6 percent. The company’s overall PC graphics shipments increased 11 percent.
Intel’s desktop processor embedded graphics (EPGs) shipments increased from last quarter by 7.2 percent, and notebooks increased by 1.9 percent. The company’s overall PC graphics shipments increased 4.1 percent.
Nvidia’s desktop discrete shipments decreased 21 percent from last quarter; and the company’s notebook discrete shipments increased 6.9 percent. The company’s overall PC graphics shipments decreased 8.3 percent.
Year-to-year this quarter AMD’s overall PC shipments decreased 22 percent, Intel increased 4.2 percent, Nvidia decreased 12.7 percent, and others essentially went away.
Total discrete GPU (desktop and notebook) shipments from the last quarter decreased 3.6 percent, and decreased 13.3 percent from last year. Sales of discrete GPUs fluctuate due to a variety of factors (timing, memory pricing, etc.) and the influence of integrated graphics. Overall, the trend for discrete GPUs has increased with a CAGR from 2014 to 2017 now of -5.6 percent (from -10 percent).
Ninety nine percent of Intel’s non-server processors have graphics, and over 65 percent of AMD’s non-server processors contain integrated graphics; AMD still ships integrated graphics chipsets (IGPs).
Year-to-year for the quarter, the graphics market decreased. Shipments were down 3.2 million units from this quarter last year, which is a smaller decline than last quarter and suggests the big declines may be leveling off.
