Judging by how desperate everybody is for Bitcoin ASICs seems like it would be the perfect business to be in.
Huge DEMAND, very little or no supply.
You could easily create a monopoly. Too bad its very expensive to actually design and manufacteur the ASICs.
They HAVE the monopoly bro........you senile or what??
THEY have the chips.....
Bitmain does not have a monopoly - and to my specific knowlage there are at least 5 companies with working or are working on SHA256 mining chips (I am NOT counting Innosilicon in that, they appear to have dropped the A3 for some reason - likely relating to inadaquate efficiency if it was going to be comparable to the BW.COM LK1401 chip).
The "apparent" monopoly was all about BitMain getting to market first - and Caanan killed it with their Avalon 721 release (and now there seems to be a wave of BitFury machines FINALLY showing up for public sale to add to the "overdue" competition).
The others (BW.COM and one I've recently become aware of but am not allowed to talk about) don't appear to be interested in selling their chips or miners to outside customers (or ONLY to large industrial-scale customers perhaps in the case of BW.COM).
Did I say Bitmain?? No I did not....I inferred that CHIP makers (Bitmain IS included though) have the monopoly on miners..........
Only 2 makers are selling to the public in decent quantities.....Bitmain & Caanan.....maybe 1 or 2 others selling VERY limited amounts of miners....
What is your definition of a monopoly?? Mine is,THEY control the market,which all these makers do,since YOU cannot make your own chip....
I kinda lump all chip makers as a monopoly,cause you CANNOT mine BTC with anything except ASICs & you HAVE to buy from them & only them....
Newegg,Tiger direct,Micrcenter,etc do NOT carry ASICs.Nor do ANY stores,so again,it's a monopoly.....
