Ben Bajarin

Ben studies how technology transitions reshape competitive advantage and market structure, from semiconductors and AI infrastructure to adoption and business strategy.

Research · March 1, 2025

Nvidia Management on GPU vs. Custom ASIC Debate

The GPU vs. Custom ASIC debate is easily one of the most talked about dynamics regarding AI compute infrastructure. I have dug deeply into the debate in this article here (Understanding the Hyper Scaler Custom ASIC Strategy).  There is no doubt this is a central question NVIDIA executives get from i

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Research · February 19, 2025

iPhone 16e Positioning in the Market and Apple C1 Strategy

Today Apple officially announced the newest member of the iPhone family, which includes the newest member of the Apple silicon family: the C1 (Cellular 1), their first-party Apple-designed cellular modem. iPhone 16e Position in the Market Where does the new iPhone fit in the current iPhone lineup is

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Research · February 13, 2025

China’s Smartphone Golden Refresh: Don’t Call it a Super Cycle

China’s smartphone market, the world’s largest, could be at an inflection point not seen since the initial smartphone boom. In recent quarters, the market has shown signs of recovery, with local brands benefiting from a surge in premium offerings as more Chinese consumers are willing to spend on new

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Research · February 11, 2025

Understanding Hyperscaler Custom ASIC Strategy

The GPU vs. Custom ASIC debate is one of the most talked about in our circles of tech executives and investors. It is also a debate that requires more in-depth analysis to fully understand. I want to look at the custom ASIC strategy in two ways relative to this debate. The first is how custom…

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Research · February 6, 2025

AMD Q424 Earnings – What’s Going on With AMD?

Key Takeaways The Narrative is clearly shifting as concerns the AI product roadmap is weaker than expected AMD’s datacenter GPU business faces a muted growth outlook in 1H25, with revenue expected to be flat versus 2H24 ($5.1B total in 2024). While management expects acceleration in 2H25 with the MI

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Research · February 3, 2025

Creative Strategies Welcomes Austin Lyons to the Team

We at Creative Strategies, Inc. are excited to announce that Austin Lyons, the author of the popular semiconductor newsletter Chipstrat is joining our distinguished team. Austin joins the team after spending 2 years at John Deere as a product manager working on the autonomous tractor team. He also p

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Research · November 6, 2024

Arm Q2: V9 & CSS Transform Growth Model

Key Takeaways Strong Value-Based Pricing Power: Demonstrated by smartphone royalty revenue growing 40% despite only 4% unit growth, showing Arm’s ability to capture significantly more value per chip through V9 adoption and pricing power. This decoupling of revenue from units is a fundamental shift i

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