ABIT rumored to quit mobo business

Hot off the press, Digitimes is reporting that ABIT may begin phasing out its motherboard business after evaluating the success of its forthcoming Intel 4 series lineup of motherboard products. ABIT shipped three million motherboards in 2007 and while that may sound like a large number, it's a mere fraction of what the likes of ASUS and GIGABYTE ship. It had a goal of shipping six million motherboards this year but has since reduced its forecast.

ABIT was once the hottest motherboard an enthusiast could own often providing the best overclocking results and performance numbers. After some financial issues back a few years ago, ABIT almost sunk but was gobbled up by Universal Scientific Industrial (USI). Unfortunately at around the same time, most of ABIT's key staff were leaving the company or had already left and things never really got better for the once motherboard king.

While the report does mention that ABIT is maintaining it does not know anything about the speculation and will continue to develop motherboard products, it wouldn't be a surprise. ABIT's current batch of new motherboards haven't been that exciting and we even saw a motherboard released recently which didn't even include solid capacitors. ABIT used to be the one setting the trends in motherboard technology but now it is clear they are falling behind the eight ball.

We can partly confirm these claims as we have heard first hand that ABIT is already laying off staff and one long time and loyal staff member was not even phoned but sent a letter with the bad news.

Is this the beginning of the end for ABIT? We'll dig for more news during Computex next week.