FPGA pricing

[kazam]

Hi,

I'm looking at incorporating an Altera Cyclone V 5CEA2 in my product. Single quantity pricing is ~USD30.

What can I expect for 1k? 10k? Roughly of course.

/K

[Scrts]

For 10k units with strong negotiation you could do about 6-7USD directly from Altera. I am not sure about 1k pricing though, because you'd have to go through distributor.

[kazam]

Great, thanks!

Is the 10k limit a fact? 2.5k is conceivable, that would take me a year to get through. Four years supply is a little on the high side.

Seems really hard to get any kind of price break on these things!

[Scrts]

For the same LE density, why not consider XC5SLX25? The cheapest one I can find is $12 at single unit.

Is it in China? Seems a good price.

[kazam]

For the same LE density, why not consider XC5SLX25? The cheapest one I can find is $12 at single unit.

I can't find any info on XC5SLX25 so I assume you mean the Spartan-6 XC6SLX25.

Yes, this would definitely be an option and I searched alibaba. There seems to be some good deals to be had. Perhaps it's best to order a few hundred units from different vendors and see what you get.

There is an issue with the FPGA developer being more versed in Altera rather than Xilinx but problems are meant to be solved. Area wise this would be as good of a choice as the Altera part.

Looking at packaging I see that if I go for the FT(G)256 package I could switch over to the LX16 part if I'm succesful in minimizing the project size. That's reassuring!

Great feedback, I'm calming down now...

[AndyC_772]

If you want a price for 1k or 10k pcs, why ask here? None of us can possibly know what your distributor will quote you, but there's no harm at all in asking them for a quote. You'll get an idea of lead time and what the distributor or factory stock level is too.

If there's a compelling commercial case to switch to a Xilinx part instead, get the developer involved right now and explain the cost / benefit analysis you've done. Ask what the impact is likely to be of switching. FPGAs are anything but generic items for which drop-in replacements exist; you're asking the designer to learn a whole new tool chain and a whole new set of embedded logic blocks which may or may not do the job at all, and if they do, may or may not work the same way.

You may be indevertently throwing away a great deal of experience in specifying timing constraints, clock structures and relationships, or requirements for signal integrity... all manner of things which are only apparent to an experienced FPGA designer, and not at all obvious otherwise.

I use Altera exclusively, and whilst I'm sure competing products may be a better fit in some cases, the time and risk in switching have never been shown to me to be worthwhile. Maybe the day will come when I'm asked to do a cost sensitive, high volume FPGA-based design, but until then, low risk and short time-to-market have always been more important.

[Edited to fix heinous grammatical error which I blame on early morning coffee deficiency]

[kazam]

Point taken, I just wanted to get a feel for the transparency in the sales process which seems to be really low when it comes to FPGA:s. There's no price break at all when you look at the official distributors like there is for other components.

The developer is well versed in Altera parts but has worked with Xilinx as well. All other things equal I would prefer Altera but not at a 5x price premium, there's just no room for that in the BOM.

These are all good points and time-to-market is definitely important!

If you want a price for 1k or 10k pcs, why ask here? None of us can possibly know what your distributor will quote you, but there's no harm at all in asking them for a quote. You'll get an idea of lead time and what the distributor or factory stock level is too.

If there's a compelling commercial case to switch to a Xilinx part instead, get the developer involved right now and explain the cost / benefit analysis you've done. Ask what the impact is likely to be of switching. FPGAs are anything but generic items for which drop-in replacements exist; your asking the designer to learn a whole new tool chain and a whole new set of embedded logic blocks which may or may not do the job at all, and if they do, may or may not work the same way.

You may be indevertently throwing away a great deal of experience in specifying timing constraints, clock structures and relationships, or requirements for signal integrity... all manner of things which are only apparent to an experienced FPGA designer, and not at all obvious otherwise.

I use Altera exclusively, and whilst I'm sure competing products may be a better fit in some cases, the time and risk in switching have never been shown to me to be worthwhile. Maybe the day will come when I'm asked to do a cost sensitive, high volume FPGA-based design, but until then, low risk and short time-to-market have always been more important.

[AndyC_772]

For smaller devices it might be worth looking at Cyclone IV or even III as well, if you haven't already. Newer doesn't always seem to be better price/performance, in my experience with Altera.

[kazam]

As a matter of fact I know that the design will fit in a Cyclone III EP3C16E144C8N.

I took for granted that the newer generations would have better price/performance due to smaller processes but apparently this is not necessarily the case.

I will investigate this further and as I mentioned earlier I prefer to stay with Altera if at all possible.

Thanks!

/K

For smaller devices it might be worth looking at Cyclone IV or even III as well, if you haven't already. Newer doesn't always seem to be better price/performance, in my experience with Altera.

[Cerebus]

If you want a price for 1k or 10k pcs, why ask here?

The advantage of asking here is knowing what sort of price other people have paid. If you have prior knowledge of what sort of price you might be able to push a distributor to, you'll be better placed to do a good job of negotiating a price with them. If you know a 60% discount is possible on some line and you get offered 30% you can push for a much better deal, if you don't know you might take the 30% and pay 75% too much. Those percentage figures are taken from from my own real life buying experience.

... but there's no harm at all in asking them for a quote.

Yes there is, the phone call you get every month when the salesman is trying to meet quota and calls to see if "you're ready to place that order yet?".  That can eat up a surprising amount of time and you have to be reasonably friendly when they call if you ever what to be able to beat a good price out of them when you are actually ready to buy something. Negotiating a good price takes time and energy that you should save for when you are actually ready and able to make a deal.

[KE5FX]

Yes there is, the phone call you get every month when the salesman is trying to meet quota and calls to see if "you're ready to place that order yet?".  That can eat up a surprising amount of time and you have to be reasonably friendly when they call if you ever what to be able to beat a good price out of them when you are actually ready to buy something. Negotiating a good price takes time and energy that you should save for when you are actually ready and able to make a deal.

That's why you give them the number of a pay phone at a gas station in Forks, Washington that was torn down 3 years ago and replaced with the town's official "Twilight" museum and gift shop.