AMD in 2012: Cloudy With a Chance of Tablets

AMD traditionally updates customers, the press and its customers with a full day worth of presentations and meetings about the company's strategy in the immediate future. While we do not know yet what the content will be in detail, the invitation shows a tablet that is connecting to cloud applications. The topic of the event is "Consumerization", "Cloud" and "Convergence".

Of course, the hint is that AMD will be aiming to cover the cloud aspect with its high-end processors, and convergence would be referring to multiple platforms growing into one. However, the consumerization aspect is the interesting one for AMD. Typically, we refer to consumerization as a trend that first emerges in the consumer world and then makes its way into business, which is quite different from what we have seen in the IT industry in the past when technologies trickled down from businesses to the consumer.

Tablets are the obvious technology AMD will be aiming for with new products we should be seeing in 2012. This may be a shift from a previous note provided by CEO Rory Read during the Q3 earnings call, when he said that he was not "sure the tablet just in the form factor itself is the real game in hand" and indicated that AMD may be looking at different form factors.

What we know for sure is that Read is cracking down on manufacturing, which should enable AMD to execute on its roadmap much better than it has been the case this year. Expect a number of announcements that will especially address greater flexibility of processor production.

  • megamanx00
    foolish fools.

    Well, I guess when you bomb really bad in your main market *cough* Bulldozer *cough* you look for other opportunities for revenue. Even so tablets are a low margin business and if AMD puts too many resources into it before they are really ready to compete they will loose alot of money. Of course, Dirk Meyer knew that.
    Reply
  • amk-aka-Phantom
    Consumerization

    :lol: Poor, poor AMD... Crush them, Intel! Death to the cloud!
    Reply
  • drwho1
    I enjoyed the movie: "Cloudy with a chance of Meatballs"

    But I will never endorse or use the "cloud" nor "the tablets" in any way.
    Reply
  • zanny
    megamanx00foolish fools.Well, I guess when you bomb really bad in your main market *cough* Bulldozer *cough* you look for other opportunities for revenue. Even so tablets are a low margin business and if AMD puts too many resources into it before they are really ready to compete they will loose alot of money. Of course, Dirk Meyer knew that.
    Bulldozer was everything but a "main market" product. Chipset manufacturers make 95% of their money off either consumer grade products (aka, Dell laptops and Emachines, workstations fall in this class of bulk product) or high end servers. AMD has never been a big server chip maker, Xeon has dominated for a while.

    But the target audience of i7 chips and Bulldozer is strictly an enthusiast DYI builder class of buyer. They recognize it is often this audience that makes the buying decisions for everyone else, but their main revenue stream is not selling high end CPUs. For every Sandy Bridge E chip they sell this quarter they will sell thousands of i3s. For every bulldozer chip, hundreds of llanos.
    Reply
  • atikkur
    i will make cloud fail.
    Reply
  • Onus
    The whole concept of the "cloud" is anathema to the PERSONAL Computer. I want all of it, especially my data, where only I can get my grubby mitts on it. If I want to communicate with "X," I will send an email to "X," not puffed like a smoke signal into some cloud. If I want an update or download from "Y," I'll connect to "Y," not to some cloud aggregation that will send me who knows what, or tell who knows who just what I downloaded.
    Reply
  • that CEO is going to destroy AMD, mark my words.
    Reply
  • captaincharisma
    can AMD be like linux? horrible in the mainstream PC market but successful in others
    Reply
  • spasmolytic46
    AMD, I am disappoint.
    Reply
  • spentshells
    HP tablet = fail
    RIM tablet = fail
    99% of Android tablets = fail
    There is a pattern can you see it ?
    this is apple turf smarten up.
    um unless you are joining apple which I could see happening
    Reply