While at IDF August 2005, HEXUS got the chance to interview the General Manager of S3 Graphics, Ken Weng. A lot has happened to the S3 name over the years. S3 Incorporated is no more, but S3 Graphics Co. Ltd. is now a VIA Technologies joint venture company. We've seen a small selection of S3 product powered solutions, such as Unichrome, but nothing to really put S3 back on the map. So, we set out to ask Mr. Weng where the company was headed, and how they were going to get there.
HEXUS: S3's company info page identifies the company as 'a leading supplier in the 3D enabled PC graphics market'. In what way would you consider yourselves leading?
Ken Weng: This statement will ring true with the new products that we are bringing out.
HEXUS: The company says it ships graphics solutions to top-tier notebook manufacturers, do you have any examples?
KW: Our graphics cores, which ship to the VIA corporation are sold to many tier one companies. For example HP is shipping VIA UMA Graphics products.
HEXUS: Are you trying to win any other business?
KW: I believe within the course of the next year you will see a lot more progress.
HEXUS: Is the new S3 profitable? Or is your parent company - VIA Technologies still investing heavily in you?
KW: We are not profitable as an organisation, we are at a semi 'start phase'. We are in a funding stage for the high end products. VIA are happy and excited about the progress being made and over the course of the next year we are becoming more visible. We have been very quiet for the past 1/2 a year intentionally giving us opportunity to get the basics right.
HEXUS: Where do you see S3's position in the graphics market?
KW: When we started up we were in an engineering catch up phase. Our strategy is to start with area that we have expertise in and broaden that to give us competitiveness. We will see this over the next year.
HEXUS: Your company vision is to create world-class graphics solutions. How would you define world class?
KW: The concept of world class is that whichever segment we are targeting, we should to be perceived as dominating in one place. In performance terms - we will have the lowest power consumption within that segment. When talking about high quality media focused products S3 had a leading product in the form of the Savage family. OEM partners should be starting to think about a 3rd player in the market.
HEXUS: S3 products have been around for years, recently however there has been a growing concern with the fact every time a product comes out it seems to be late, or around 18 months out of date. How is this going to change?"
KW: I am not used to being late so this will change. My feelings are that the Chrome20 is probably the first time for a while that we are comfortable within the market place.
HEXUS: What background and experience do you have within the industry?
KW: My career started with mainframes, in Chip and Technologies - pioneer (wingine) of graphics. I spent time at SGI (7 months) helping design the Nintendo 64.
HEXUS: Haven't a lot of S3 ASIC and other design engineers progressively left S3 for ATi and other 3D graphics design companies? Who's left?
KW: When a company is going through different stages - you can't judge it based on individuals; it's dependant on the team having a critical mass. We've been very stable for the past 4 years. Chief Architect, John Brothers is now back with us
HEXUS: Do you have any examples of forward looking solutions that have come/are coming from S3?
KW: Solutions such as HDTV connectivity and component video connection.
HEXUS: The company info page expresses S3 Graphics' dedication to developing 'outstanding graphics solutions', do you have any recent examples of such solutions?
KW: That's yet to be proven in reference to any particular aspect. However we're really focused on power consumption.
HEXUS: How has S3 Graphics built upon the work of the old S3 Incorporated?
KW: If you look at the history of S3, most of the products which are out there utilise previous S3 technology from before, in some way.
HEXUS: What are S3's strengths and weaknesses?
KW: The team has a long history of commitment to S3. Our weakness would be that products for the past 2 or so years haven't been up to scratch. Without the team the
company would have not survived; there are a lot of seasoned people within it.
HEXUS: Does S3 have a clear mission statement?
KW: The best way to think of this is that we are focused on providing the best product to the mainstream market. We want a perfect out
of the box experience, though this does not mean we won't enter the high end market.
HEXUS: When do you foresee this being delivered?
KW: We believe the Chrome 20 series is the beginning of this - the first step.
HEXUS: Can S3 be more than just an alternative to ATI and NVIDIA? Is there anywhere you believe S3 can 'win'?
KW: We want to be really strong in performance and power consumption - something that Intel is also beginning to realise the importance of.
HEXUS.quickfire
To finish off the interview, we put Ken through our set of HEXUS.quickfire questions. Just a bit of fun!
McDonalds or Burger King? - Neither, I'm a healthy eater
CRT or TFT? - TFT
DS or PSP? - I'm attached to the DS but can see where the PSP is going.
Quake or Unreal Tournament? - UT
ATI or NVIDIA? - I will give NVIDIA the hat
USB or Firewire - USB, although Firewire started as my favourite.
Red Bull or Proplus? - I don't know the 2nd one.
Top Gun or Days of Thunder? - Top Gun
Lager or Bitter? - Bitter
AMD or Intel? - AMD
SLI or CrossFire? - Hah, neither of them are very good ;)
Headphones or speakers? - Speakers
J.Lo or Jennifer Anniston? - Neither, my wife will kill me!
Finally, what would you have done differently? - I never think about that, I am forward thinking.
Thanks to Ken and S3 Graphics for the interivew opportunity.
