The longstanding EVGA Nvidia partnership has been terminated, in a shocking reveal by Gamers Nexus. The site spoke with EVGA CEO Andrew Han on the reason behind the sudden rift between the two companies, given that EVGA touts being “the #1 Nvidia authorized partner in channel sales throughout US and UK” on its official Twitter account. Han cites a “souring relationship with Nvidia” as the primary cause, and states that EVGA will be exiting the video card market altogether.
EVGA leaves Nvidia because of a lack of “respect”
Speaking further on the issue, Han wants to be clear that the company will no longer stand with NVIDIA moving forward:
“We are not going to be on [NVIDIA CEO] Jensen’s lap on stage, so I don’t want people to speculate what’s going on [when we’re not there]… EVGA has decided to not carry the next gen.”
Furthermore, Han felt “constrained” by Nvidia to the point that he said that the decision to part with the company was “easy.” It was working with Nvidia that was “hard.” According to Han, the decision was made as a matter of principle, not a financial one. He says that Nvidia does not give EVGA, let alone other GPU board makers, information on the cost of purchasing chips in a timely manner, and that Nvidia’s Founder Edition cards undercuts EVGA’s ability to sell their cards.
For now, EVGA will be “continuing the current product line” of video cards, but it plans to “continue current gen [until it runs out].” In fact, EVGA will “cease all video card manufacturing operations” so long as Han remains CEO. It will not return to Nvidia to create the GeForce RTX 40-series, and it doesn’t have plans to partner with Intel or AMD in lieu of Nvidia’s absence. Existing customers will still be supported by EVGA’s warranties, with the company holding inventory in case its customers need to replace or fulfill cards.
Gamers Nexus cites that Nvidia comprises 80% of EVGA revenue, so the company will need to be careful if it wants to remain solvent. EVGA does not plan to expand into new product categories nor does it have plans to sell its business. Gamers Nexus anticipates that this will mean layoffs at the company, though EVGA does not plan on doing so at this time. However, the site also believes that EVGA likely over-ordered product during the crypto-mining boom and has found itself on the losing end of the deal.
In other news, the Call of Duty DMZ mode will be launching at the same time as Warzone 2.0, and the full Street Fighter 6 character roster will feature 18 fighters at launch.