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[Elektro Demon]

https://wccftech.com/nvidia-delays-major-gtc-product-announcement-due-to-covid/

NVIDIA had been preparing something spicy for release at GTC this year. This much is obvious from how much the company tried to salvage any semblance of a "show" and get their major product announcement out. It seems, however, that they have accepted COVID's impact in a blog titled "GTC News Can Wait". Either that or the company expects the coronavirus to have a significant impact on the economy and want to rethink their strategy with regards to whatever product announcement they had ready (likely a flagship GPU architecture).

NVIDIA postpones major GTC product announcement due to Coronavirus impact
I do feel for the company. From their actions, they were really excited to share whatever it was. GTC is usually home to the professional side of things and it is possible the company was planning on announcing their professional Ampere-based GPUs on this iteration. You can see NVIDIA's increasingly desperate attempts to salvage the show from the GTC timeline, which went something like this:

• First, the company insisted it would not cancel GTC and would take extra security measures.
• GTC was then moved to an online-only event with the full show live-streamed.
• The live stream got canceled and the "product" announcement was supposed to come out on time as regular news.
• Now it seems NVIDIA has completely postponed that major product announcement as well (the talks and research portions will still be live-streamed as per schedule).

NVIDIA posted the following on their blog earlier today:

"We have exciting products and news to share with you.

But this isn’t the right time. We’re going to hold off on sharing our GTC news for now.

That way, our employees, partners, the media and analysts who follow us, and our customers around the world can focus on staying safe and reducing the spread of the virus.

We will still stream tons of great content from researchers and developers who have prepared great talks.

This is a time to focus on our family, our friends, our community. Our employees are working from home. Many hourly workers will not need to work but they’ll all be fully paid.

Stay safe everyone. We will get through this together."

While its a pity considering NVIDIA is the only company innovating in high-end graphics right now, the health of employees (and attendees) comes first so it is not surprising to see this. That said, considering the panel live streams (of researchers) are still going ahead as scheduled, this makes me think that this delay has more to do with an internal reassessment with regards to COVID impact to the business cycle than anything else. What do you think?

 

[Hellgardia]

AKA we aren't ready to show it yet

 

[Elektro Demon]

AKA we aren't ready to show it yet

I think it's because they feel Corona might impact their sales. Or maybe the xbox and ps5 specs releases interest people more and they're afraid they won't get as much media coverage.

 

[kiphalfton]

Considering most of nvidia's presentations I've seen consist of Jensen talking for 1+ hour straight, without any other product professionals involvement, not sure what's stopping nvidia from airing SOMETHING. Also not like an audience need to be present anyways. So a digital stream would have been perfect.

 

[Entroyp]

Nooo

 

[Aidah]

I'm really waiting on new PC parts.

 

[lukilladog]

Or course, you can´t have a succesful product launch ATM, July at least. I wanted to see if Jensen is still growing blonde hair.

 

[xPikYx]

It's not due to Covid, but due to next gen consoles reveal, it's a juggernaut that can't be stopped by showing a new 1000+$ GPU

 

[PhoenixTank]

Considering most of nvidia's presentations I've seen consist of Jensen talking for 1+ hour straight, without any other product professionals involvement, not sure what's stopping nvidia from airing SOMETHING. Also not like an audience need to be present anyways. So a digital stream would have been perfect.

Supply chain and related uncertainty. Has to be.
Remember the shitstorm when AMD made changes to the 5600 config/bios around Chinese New Year? That but worse right now.

 

[VFXVeteran]

Awww.. crap. I hope they don't delay the new Ampere this year. This virus is in it's early early stages here in the U.S. and I don't see the light at the end of the tunnel for at least a year (economy wise).