AMD Nixing ATI Label In Brand Consolidation Move

About four years after chip maker AMD said it would purchase graphics processor company and Radeon maker ATI, the parent company said this week it would retire the ATI label for a more focused branding strategy, Bloomberg BusinessWeek reported. The cancellation of the brand means that a label closely associated with PC gaming will be gone after about 25 years of existence. But AMD believes that dropping "ATI" is for the better. Slides sent to PC hardware outlets including HotHardware had AMD arguing that, according to a survey, graphics card users find that the AMD brand is stronger than ATI, and "Radeon" and "FirePro" brands by themselves have very high awareness. The subsequent change in branding will not affect AMD's product line or plans, the company said. The ATI label is currently attached to FirePro workstation graphics accelerators, mutli-display tech Eyefinity and the popular Radeon line of graphics cards. AMD announced it would acquire ATI in 2006, and later bought the company for $5.4 billion. The branding consolidation will happen with the Q4 2010 introduction of AMD's new line of next generation accelerated processing units ("APUs") that combine CPU and GPU capabilities into one piece of hardware. Existing products will retain the ATI brand, the company said. In many instances, the ATI logo is displayed on products such as computing hardware, PCs or business partners' websites, with no mention of AMD (some of AMD's survey respondents weren't aware of the affiliation between AMD and ATI). However, AMD is hoping that new branding that prominently shows AMD's name alongside product offerings could raise the parent company's profile among gamers.