NVIDIA paying AIB partners for wasted GeForce RTX 4080 12GB packaging

NVIDIA has officially "unlaunched" its GeForce RTX 4080 12GB graphics cards, but what about all of the AIB partners that had announced their custom GeForce RTX 4080 12GB cards... and started making retail packaging for them? Well, some of those costs will be recouped and covered by Uncle Jensen.

We can't just see these boxes have stickers slapped over them, replacing the "GeForce RTX 4080 12GB" to whatever NVIDIA calls it: GeForce RTX 4070 12GB or GeForce RTX 4070 Ti 12GB. It will be tacky, and not look good for the biggest GPU launch in NVIDIA's history. Nope. NVIDIA is working with AIB partners that had already made retail boxes for the now-unlaunched GeForce RTX 4080 12GB.

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NVIDIA is reimbursing some AIB partners for the retail packaging on the GeForce RTX 4080 12GB, where the boxes will be collected, and destroyed. Disappointing. We don't know if NVIDIA is repaying the AIB partners for the losses they'll make on the retail packaging, or if it'll include everything (the people who actually have to destroy the packaging, which will take time).

Why the mention of labor time? Well, as VideoCardz points out -- and its pretty obvious -- labor costs will include the untold amount of staffers that will have to take the now-unlaunched GeForce RTX 4080 12GB graphics cards out of the retail boxes, remove any and all stickers, references to the "RTX 4080 12GB" and everything in between.

A new BIOS will probably have to be used, which will take more time... especially given how long these cards have been sitting in boxes ready to go to gamers. It's not a good look for NVIDIA, riding right into its competitors' RDNA 3 GPU announcement in early November.

NVIDIA still has the phenomenally powerful GeForce RTX 4090 out in the wild... more on the GeForce RTX 4090 above, with my reviews on NVIDIA's own GeForce RTX 4090 Founders Edition, the custom ASUS ROG Strix GeForce RTX 4090 OC Edition, and MSI's new GeForce RTX 4090 SUPRIM LIQUID X, which is kept chill by an AIO cooler.