“South Korea is a country where technologies in various industries have developed, including artificial intelligence (AI), cloud services, finance, and telecommunications, making it a very important market for AMD. Given that AMD has proven superior performance and power efficiency compared to competitors, the company plans to accelerate its strategy in the South Korean market.”
Dan McNamara, senior vice president of AMD, said this while meeting with ChosunBiz on the 14th at the Courtyard Marriott Seoul Pangyo in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province. McNamara is the senior vice president and general manager of AMD's server division, overseeing high-performance server products including cloud. Before joining AMD, he worked as a senior vice president and general manager at Intel.
McNamara noted, “In the first quarter of this year, AMD's data center business saw a 57% increase in revenue compared to the same period last year,” and added that “the market share (based on revenue) is also growing rapidly in the data center market, reaching 40%.”
AMD recorded revenue of $7.44 billion (approximately 10.3 trillion won) in the first quarter, surpassing the consensus of $7.13 billion compiled by financial information provider LSEG. The revenue from AMD's data center division was $3.7 billion (approximately 5.1655 trillion won), accounting for nearly half of the total revenue.
AMD plans to increase its market share in South Korea using power efficiency and performance as key advantages. McNamara stated, “Every time new products are launched, AMD demonstrates superiority in energy efficiency and performance,” and noted that the company is enhancing its ecosystem capabilities, including software that enables customers to efficiently adopt AI.
He also mentioned plans to expand their business area based on the mid-range model "EPYC 4005" series, which can be utilized not only by large corporations but also by small and medium-sized enterprises. He explained that while existing major clients in telecommunications and finance prioritize performance, “general IT corporations often place importance on energy and expense, so we plan to broaden our product line to target this market.”
AMD also plans to timely produce and introduce next-generation processors for servers. The company announced that the next-generation "EPYC" processor (codename Venice), scheduled for launch next year, will use TSMC's 2 nm process (‘N2’ process, with 1 nm being one billionth of a meter). This product will be the first semiconductor for high-performance computing (HPC) to utilize the N2 process.
McNamara said, “We are developing that processor, which is expected to be officially launched next year,” adding, “Since TSMC is at the forefront in 2 nm processes, we are focused on developing and mass-producing semiconductors with the highest efficiency per watt and performance.”
He was reserved about the possibility of utilizing advanced processes from Samsung Electronics’ foundry division. He said, “It is true that we have been collaborating with TSMC for a long time, but AMD is not a company limited to specific corporations,” and emphasized, “If we can provide the best products and services to our customers, we can collaborate with any corporation.”
He also conveyed a cautious stance regarding the U.S. semiconductor export restrictions against China. McNamara stated, “We plan to carry out our business while complying with various regulations from the U.S. government.” AMD projected that it would suffer impacts of approximately $700 million (around 970 billion won) in the second quarter and $1.5 billion (around 2.8 trillion won) for the entire year due to the U.S. government's export controls against China. It is reported that its competitor, NVIDIA, is planning to produce low-spec semiconductors that could circumvent the U.S. export restrictions.