That is a reasonable assessment.
Nvidia and Qualcomm are just so... Nvidia and Qualcomm like. They can't help themselves.
That being said, history also suggests AMD will bungle the software side.
Nvidia and Qualcomm are just so... Nvidia and Qualcomm like. They can't help themselves.
That being said, history also suggests AMD will bungle the software side.
Consider a senior SWE at e.g. NVIDIA making $300k, let's say halfsies split between base and RSU. The $150k RSU grant from a few years ago that still hasn't fully vested is worth $1M now. So even for a 50% increase in nominal total comp, it doesn't make financial sense to switch.
I don't know that anyone can afford to pay their engineers 10x more than the competition, and then also offer a cheaper product with thinner margins.
In my experience, pretty much all software engineering positions pay better than hardware engineering positions with equivalent experience. I don't fully understand why, as hardware is hard and if you have a really good hardware engineering team you can shave months off your time to market, so those engineers should be just as valuable to a business as systems/embedded software people.
Based on that people end up earning what they consider "a comfortable wage". Some people are not going to feel comfortable until they can buy a jet for their acro-flying hobby, some are happy when they can afford to easily save 1 year of income and being able to afford to buy a new pc every 3 years.
Other people have no idea these opportunities exist and they are miserable working in one place for a decade. Or they are not willing or can't take risks.
That's how we end up with two people doing similar jobs one earning $100k and the other $500k. In days of remote work the biggest differentiating factor in the earning potential IMO is your English (if not a native speaker) and willingness to work in timezones 6h+ away.
I think it has to do with the VC faucet, a completely irrational capital allocation mechanism.
But you are right; the hardware market is harder than making web stuff. I just enjoy hardware/firmware more. Currently I am starting a new hardware/firmware project for a US company that will last 3 years with this income.
It depends where you live, spend and how you count; i optimised everything for the past 25+ years around making sure I never have to think about money if I would drop everything today. Your situation might be very different of course.
That disrupts the organization because the hardware people are arguably smarter and more talented than software people. They have actual engineering degrees.
A good software org has to value its people. A good hardware org is a manufacturing operation tries to minimize personnel costs.