Advanced Micro Devices (AMD)
Canvas Category OEM : Semiconductor
We care deeply about transforming lives with AMD technology to enrich our industry, our communities, and the world. Our mission is to build great products that accelerate next-generation computing experiences – the building blocks for the data center, artificial intelligence, PCs, gaming and embedded. Underpinning our mission is the AMD culture. We push the limits of innovation to solve the world’s most important challenges. We strive for execution excellence while being direct, humble, collaborative, and inclusive of diverse perspectives.
Assembly Line
Ayar Labs, with Investments from AMD, Intel Capital, and NVIDIA, Secures $155 Million to Address Urgent Need for Scalable, Cost-Effective AI Infrastructure
Ayar Labs, the leader in optical interconnect solutions for large-scale AI workloads, announced it has secured $155 million in financing led by Advent Global Opportunities and Light Street Capital to break down the AI bottleneck of data movement with its optical I/O technology. This brings the company’s total funding to $370 million and raises the company’s valuation to above $1 billion. The strength of the round and caliber of investors, including participation from AMD Ventures, Intel Capital, and NVIDIA, marks another key milestone as Ayar Labs prepares its optical solution for high volume manufacturing strategically aligned to customer roadmaps. Other new strategic and financial investors participating in the round include 3M Ventures and Autopilot. They join existing investors such as Applied Ventures LLC, Axial Partners, Boardman Bay Capital Management, GlobalFoundries, IAG Capital Partners, Lockheed Martin Ventures, Playground Global, and VentureTech Alliance.
Ayar Labs has developed the industry’s first in-package optical I/O solution to replace electrical I/O that is standards-based, commercial-ready, and optimized for AI training and inference. Optical I/O allows customers to maximize the compute efficiency and performance of their AI infrastructure, while reducing costs and power consumption, to dramatically improve profitability metrics for AI applications.
AMD to Significantly Expand Data Center AI Systems Capabilities with Acquisition of Hyperscale Solutions Provider ZT Systems
AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) announced the signing of a definitive agreement to acquire ZT Systems, a leading provider of AI infrastructure for the world’s largest hyperscale computing companies. The strategic transaction marks the next major step in AMD’s AI strategy to deliver leadership AI training and inferencing solutions based on innovating across silicon, software and systems. ZT Systems’ extensive experience designing and optimizing cloud computing solutions will also help cloud and enterprise customers significantly accelerate the deployment of AMD-powered AI infrastructure at scale.
AMD has agreed to acquire ZT Systems in a cash and stock transaction valued at $4.9 billion, inclusive of a contingent payment of up to $400 million based on certain post-closing milestones. AMD expects the transaction to be accretive on a non-GAAP basis by the end of 2025.
Following transaction close, ZT Systems will join the AMD Data Center Solutions Business Group. ZT CEO Frank Zhang will lead the manufacturing business and ZT President Doug Huang will lead the design and customer enablement teams, both reporting to AMD Executive Vice President and General Manager Forrest Norrod. AMD will seek a strategic partner to acquire ZT Systems’ industry-leading U.S.-based data center infrastructure manufacturing business.
AMD to Acquire Silo AI to Expand Enterprise AI Solutions Globally
AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) announced the signing of a definitive agreement to acquire Silo AI, the largest private AI lab in Europe, in an all-cash transaction valued at approximately $665 million. The agreement represents another significant step in the company’s strategy to deliver end-to-end AI solutions based on open standards and in strong partnership with the global AI ecosystem. The Silo AI team consists of world-class AI scientists and engineers with extensive experience developing tailored AI models, platforms and solutions for leading enterprises spanning cloud, embedded and endpoint computing markets.
Based in Helsinki, Finland, with operations in Europe and North America, Silo AI specializes in end-to-end AI-driven solutions that help customers integrate AI quickly and easily into their products, services and operations. Their work spans diverse markets, with customers including Allianz, Philips, Rolls-Royce and Unilever. Silo AI also creates state-of-the-art open source multilingual LLMs, such as Poro and Viking, on AMD platforms in addition to its SiloGen model platform.
BlackBerry Announces Collaboration with AMD to Advance Foundational Precision and Control for Robotics Industry
BlackBerry Limited announced a collaboration with AMD designed to revolutionize next-generation robotic systems by enabling new levels of low latency and jitter, and repeatable determinism. Together, the companies will address the critical need for ‘hard’ real-time capabilities in robotics-focused hardware with an affordable and powerful platform that delivers enhanced performance, reliability, and scalability for robotic systems in industrial and healthcare.
The platform combines BlackBerry® QNX® expertise in real-time foundational software solutions and the QNX® Software Development Platform (SDP) with heterogeneous hardware solutions powered by the AMD Kria™ K26 SOM that features both Arm® and FPGA programmable logic-based architecture. With Kria, an Arm® sub-system can power the advanced capabilities of the QNX microkernel real-time operating system (RTOS) while allowing users to run low latency, deterministic functions on the programable logic of the AMD Kria KR260 robotics starter kit.
Celestial AI Closes $175 Million Series C Funding Round Led by U.S. Innovative Technology Fund
Celestial AI™, creator of the Photonic Fabric™ optical interconnect technology platform, today announced it raised $175 million in its Series C funding round led by Thomas Tull’s U.S. Innovative Technology Fund (USIT). In addition to USIT, the round included participation from new and existing investors including AMD Ventures, Koch Disruptive Technologies (KDT), Temasek, Temasek’s wholly owned subsidiary Xora Innovation, IAG Capital Partners, Samsung Catalyst, Smart Global Holdings (SGH), Porsche Automobil Holding SE, Engine Ventures, M-Ventures and Tyche Partners.
Amid the explosive growth in demand for generative AI applications and next-generation data centers, hyperscalers are increasingly constrained by utility power availability, memory capacity and high cost of operation. Celestial AI’s Photonic Fabric optical interconnect technology addresses these critical challenges by revolutionizing memory and compute fabrics. This transformational solution provides the foundational technology for users to continue making advancements in AI while maintaining scalable, sustainable and profitable business models. This latest round of funding will enable Celestial AI to execute multiple large-scale customer collaborations focused on commercializing its breakthrough Photonic Fabric technology platform.
AMD + Ansys – Together We Advance
AMD Acquires Mipsology to Deepen AI Inference Software Capabilities
We welcome the talented team from Mipsology, a leader in AI software and long-standing AMD partner based in Palaiseau, France, to the AMD family.
Mipsology’s highly skilled software team has proven expertise in delivering AI software and solutions running on top of AMD adaptive computing silicon, and will join the AMD AI Group to help further accelerate our customer engagements and expand our AI software development capabilities. Specifically, the team will help develop our full AI software stack, expanding our open ecosystem of software tools, libraries and models to pave the way for streamlined deployment of AI models running on AMD hardware.
How Chip Giant AMD Finally Caught Intel
Acceleration Robotics Will Collaborate with AMD to Produce Architectural Blueprints for Robotics Using ROS
Acceleration Robotics —a robotics semiconductor startup based in the Basque Country, Spain— will collaborate with AMD, the industry’s high performance and adaptive computing leader to expand its presence in the robotics market through the development of new robotics capabilities for AMD Kria system-on-modules (SOMs) and adaptive system-on-chips (SoCs).
Adaptive Computing in Robotics: Making the Intelligent Factory Possible
Demand for robotics is accelerating rapidly. According to the research firm, Statista, the global market for industrial robots, as an example, will more than double from US$81 billion in 2021, to over US$165 billion in 2028 (1). Today, you can find the technologies you need to build a robot that is safe and secure and can operate alongside humans. But getting these technologies working together can be a huge undertaking. Complicating matters is the addition of artificial intelligence which is making it more difficult to keep up with computational demands. In order to meet today’s rapid pace of innovation, roboticists are turning toward adaptive computing platforms. These offer lower latency and deterministic, multi-axis control with built-in safety and security on a modular platform that is scalable for the future.
Intel Problems
The misplaced optimism is twofold: first there is the fact that eight years later Intel has again appointed a new CEO (Pat Gelsinger), not to replace the one I was writing about (Brian Krzanich), but rather his successor (Bob Swan). Clearly the opportunity was not seized. What is more concerning is that the question is no longer about seizing an opportunity but about survival, and it is the United States that has the most to lose.