The nVidia/Board-partners relationship seemed to go completely sideways around the launch of the 3xxx series. If you remember back to the launch, they just hurled chips at them with late notice (so some glitchy 3rd party boards shipped) and pricing they couldn't compete with nVidia's own boards on.

No idea when crypto took off and supply was constrained, who was taking the profits - but I'd guess nVidia. Now the partners are left holding huge numbers of boards as the prices crash. My guess is to get allocation from nVidia they had to commit to volume and price, but retailers can just return un-sold stock as sale or return (or just demand to pay less, as they drop prices)

I can see why if you survived that, you might just want to step aside from the market - as next time it might take you down. Especially if you're EVGA and prided yourself on premium products/support - and smell a race-to-the-bottom coming.

As majority of what you pay goes on the GPU itself (memory is at least a commodity) - there's probably not a lot of meat left for the partner that's taking the risks.

Does make you wonder what quality's going to be like on 4xxx.