AMD exec: Nvidia fell for our double bluff

Enlarge / AMD’s Scott Herkelman explains to HotHardware how he “jebaited” Nvidia. (credit: 2.5 Geeks)

Earlier this month, AMD Radeon VP Scott Herkelman tweeted a single, cryptic word: jebaited. If you’re not a big Twitch person, that probably doesn’t mean much to you. Thankfully, Herkelman made it clear for the rest of us a week later, when he appeared on HotHardware‘s 2.5 Geeks podcast to talk about the Radeon 5700 launch.

The first half of the 45 minute interview goes by with Herkelman propping up his gamer cred, then he walks through AMD’s usual talking points about contrast-adaptive sharpening and doing the usual “we love the reviewer community” routine. But about 26 minutes later, HotHardware’s Dave Altavilla asked Herkelman about the tweet—which referenced AMD’s Radeon pricing strategy—and things got more interesting.

AMD first unveiled its new Navi cards in June, with Nvidia’s forthcoming “Super” line of upclocked refreshes waiting in the wings. While the RX5700 line promised a better performance-per-dollar ratio than competing Nvidia cards—a promise that has been borne out by third-party reviews—Nvidia still had the possibility of muting AMD’s thunder with a well-timed Super release, which might bring that price:performance ratio back into line. Herkelman’s cryptic tweet dropped when Nvidia acted—and the next day, AMD slashed prices on the new cards enough to bring the entire line under the new RTX 2070 Super’s $499 asking price.