Compare moats
Up to three covered companies, band by band. Every call is a curated editorial judgment, never a disclosed figure — and every band carries its cited basis.
| Intel | Applied Digital | Wiwynn | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Moat rating | eroding The FY2025 10-K (filed 2026-01-23) repeats the concession, now broadened: 'we have lost market share in recent years, including in both client and data center markets, in the market for x86-based semiconductor products, and more generally in the markets for semiconductor compute products, as competitors have introduced highly competitive data center and client platform products.' It adds that the data-center business 'has been further negatively impacted in the past few years by the significant shift of customer spend toward GPUs optimized for AI workloads' — a historically wide moat still actively eroding. | none The FY2026 10-K (filed 2026-07-29) shows contracted revenue, not a demonstrated competitive edge. About 1,410 MW is leased under 15-year take-or-pay, non-cancellable base terms worth about $36.2 billion, but only about 100 MW of the roughly 1.5 GW that is contracted and either operating or under construction was operating and earning revenue at May 31, 2026, and Item 1A says "lessees may have the right to terminate applicable leases if there are significant delays in construction." Item 1A also concedes "We do not have the resources to compete with larger providers of similar products or services at this time," and the Competition section names 13 power-advantaged developers the company competes with. Signed leases give revenue visibility, but the filing does not show a durable advantage. | narrow The 2025 annual report (published 2026-04-30) shows a real but shallow position: products deployed in "more than 750 hyperscale data centers" and, on the Company's own internally assessed shipment volume, "more than 10% of global server shipments and nearly 30% of global ODM-Direct server shipments" in 2025 — while the same report's own list of negative factors names "Excessive concentration of customers" and a market "getting more and more competitive", discloses three customers at 41.48%, 26.03% and 10.43% of 2025 net sales, and reports 2025 gross profit up 109.77% against revenue up 163.68% for an 8.3% gross margin. Defensible incumbency, not a durable one. |
| Moat type | intangibles ip The durable assets remain the x86 architecture and process-technology IP: the FY2025 10-K claims 'We are a global leader in the design and manufacturing of CPUs and other semiconductor products' and stakes the recovery on process IP — 'Intel 18A introduces two industry firsts in high-volume semiconductor manufacturing: gate-all-around transistors (RibbonFET) and backside power delivery (PowerVia).' | none The 10-K claims three advantages: power-advantaged sites (it believes securing power and interconnection ahead of demand is 'the principal constraint on new HPC capacity and a core differentiator for us from many of our competitors'), a standardized 'franchise-style' design, and hyperscaler master service and master telecom service agreements 'that are difficult to obtain.' The filing does not show any of them to be durable. Its Competition section says competition 'centers on securing and developing sites with access to large-scale, reliable, and cost-competitive power and interconnection' and names 13 power-advantaged developers going after the same leases, and Item 1A concedes it lacks the resources to compete with larger providers. Signed leases are take-or-pay and non-cancellable, so a tenant leaving for convenience owes 'the full remaining contractual value,' but that is contractual lock-in on each lease rather than a moat source, so no moat type is assigned. | switching costs The report's "Competitive niche" section locates the advantage in the customer program rather than in IP or unit cost: "highly customized solutions for hyperscale data centers", "end-to-end technical integration capabilities ranging from server design and system integration to large-scale L10/L11 rack-level delivery", and a one-stop service "covering product design, integration, optimization, deployment, and after-sales services" across a base of more than 750 hyperscale data centers. Every advantage the section claims is about integration work and customer proximity, none about patents or proprietary silicon, and an 8.3% gross margin is not the profile of a cost advantage; what is left is the friction in an installed, co-designed rack program. |
| Leadership | fast follower The FY2025 10-K still opens 'We are a global leader in the design and manufacturing of CPUs', yet concedes lost share 'in both client and data center markets' and a spend shift 'toward GPUs optimized for AI workloads' where Intel participates via 'Xeon, AI PCs, Arc GPUs and our open software stack' plus 'inference-optimized GPUs on a targeted annual cadence' — following the AI compute market rather than setting its pace. | behind The 10-K makes no leadership claim and gives no ranking or share figure. Item 1A concedes "We do not have the resources to compete with larger providers of similar products or services at this time" and that some rivals have "substantially greater liquidity and financial resources than we do." Its Competition section places APLD against established operators (Digital Realty, Equinix), hyperscalers that build their own capacity, independent developers and 13 named power-advantaged developers (IREN, Cipher Digital, TeraWulf, Hut 8, Riot, CleanSpark, HIVE, Core Scientific, Bitdeer, Galaxy Digital, Fermi, Keel Infrastructure, MARA). | co leader The report claims "nearly 30% of global ODM-Direct server shipments" for 2025 on internally assessed volume, against an IDC Worldwide Quarterly Server Tracker base of approximately 7.7 million ODM-Direct units within roughly 16.78 million total 2025 server shipments — yet describes the Company only as "one of the major suppliers to international hyperscale data centers". Among the largest in its segment; the report makes no claim to be first. |
| Pricing power | weak The FY2025 10-K states the mechanism itself: higher-priced products 'have lower margins as they are produced at external foundries rather than in our manufacturing facilities. To the extent demand shifts from our higher-margin to lower-margin products in any of our market segments, our gross margin percentage has decreased and may decrease again' — plus $878 million of 2025 inventory reserves on the early Intel 18A ramp. | weak Item 1A says "Due to the limited number of hyperscalers, we expect that a limited number of customers will continue to account for a high percentage of our revenue for the foreseeable future," and that if customers' equipment usage declines or they discontinue use of its facilities, APLD "may be compelled to lower our lease prices in some instances or risk losing a significant customer." One customer was 59% of FY2026 revenue from continuing operations. Take-or-pay, non-cancellable terms protect contracted revenue over the base term, and Note 19 reports a $39.1M HPC Hosting segment profit on $385.3M of segment revenue in FY2026, but those terms are agreed with a small group of concentrated buyers. | weak 2025 gross margin was 8.3% and operating margin 6.7%; gross profit rose 109.77% while revenue rose 163.68%, so the margin narrowed as volume grew. The report discloses three customers at 41.48%, 26.03% and 10.43% of 2025 net sales, lists "Excessive concentration of customers" among its negative factors, and explains its main-supplier table with "The suppliers are designated by customers." |
| Summary | Still the incumbent x86 CPU designer-manufacturer — FY2025 revenue was $52.9 billion, roughly flat — but the filing concedes lost share in client and data center and an AI-driven customer shift toward GPUs; the counter-thesis is process IP, with Intel 18A shipping in Core Ultra Series 3 ('the first products to be manufactured using our new Intel 18A process technology') and Intel 14A 'designed from inception as an offering to external customers.' | Applied Digital designs, builds and operates purpose-built, liquid-cooled HPC data centers, which it calls 'AI factories', and leases the capacity to CoreWeave and investment-grade hyperscalers. At May 31, 2026 its 10-K lists five campuses (Polaris Forge 1-3 and Delta Forge 1-2) with about 1,410 MW contracted under roughly 15-year take-or-pay, non-cancellable leases worth about $36.2 billion over the base terms. The filing claims three sources of advantage: it controls power-advantaged sites, it uses a standardized 'franchise-style' design built to deliver about 150 MW in about 14 to 18 months, and it holds hyperscaler master agreements that are 'difficult to obtain.' The same document shows how early the company is. About 100 MW was operating and earning revenue. One customer was 59% of FY2026 revenue from continuing operations. It competes with Digital Realty, Equinix, hyperscalers that build their own capacity and 13 named power-advantaged developers, and it concedes that it lacks the resources to compete with larger providers. Signed leases give long-dated revenue visibility, but the filing does not show a durable competitive advantage. | Wiwynn sells ODM-Direct — it designs and builds cloud and AI server systems to hyperscale operators' specifications rather than shipping a branded product — and the 2025 annual report grounds its edge in that relationship: "highly customized solutions", integration "from server design and system integration to large-scale L10/L11 rack-level delivery", Open Compute Project participation described as "a core competitive advantage in marketing to global hyperscale data centers", and products deployed in more than 750 hyperscale data centers as of the end of 2025. The report also says that high integration and testing abilities "increases the threshold of vendors in the assembly industry and creates entry barriers". Against that, the same report lists excessive customer concentration and an increasingly competitive market as its negative factors, discloses customers at 41.48%, 26.03% and 10.43% of 2025 net sales, explains its main-supplier table with "The suppliers are designated by customers", and reports an 8.3% gross margin on 2025 revenue of NT$950.66bn. |
| Chain position | x86 compute incumbent and would-be US leading-edge foundry; its 18A/14A ramp is the main Western alternative to TSMC at the leading edge. | Developer and landlord of power-advantaged, liquid-cooled AI data-center capacity, leased long-term to CoreWeave and investment-grade hyperscalers. | The report's cloud/AI-server value-chain diagram places system assembling in the midstream and "Direct sales from original manufacturers" downstream selling to cloud service providers; Wiwynn describes itself as providing "IT equipment and rack system integration service to hyperscale data centers". 82.12% of 2025 revenue came from America. |
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| Long-horizon vote | -0.24 at weight 0.20 · swarm neutral Editorial prior, not backtested. | -0.20 at weight 0.20 · swarm neutral Editorial prior, not backtested. | +0.05 at weight 0.20 · swarm bearish Editorial prior, not backtested. |