SUNNYVALE, CA--(Marketwire - Oct 29, 2012) - In a bold strategic move, AMD ( NYSE : AMD ) announced that it will design 64-bit ARM® technology-based processors in addition to its x86 processors for multiple markets, starting with cloud and data center servers. AMD's first ARM technology-based processor will be a highly-integrated, 64-bit multicore System-on-a-Chip (SoC) optimized for the dense, energy-efficient servers that now dominate the largest data centers and power the modern computing experience. The first ARM technology-based AMD Opteron™ processor is targeted for production in 2014 and will integrate the AMD SeaMicro Freedom™ supercompute fabric, the industry's premier high-performance fabric.

AMD's new design initiative addresses the growing demand to deliver better performance-per-watt for dense cloud computing solutions. Just as AMD introduced the industry's first mainstream 64-bit x86 server solution with the AMD Opteron processor in 2003, AMD will be the only processor provider bridging the x86 and 64-bit ARM ecosystems to enable new levels of flexibility and drive optimal performance and power-efficiency for a range of enterprise workloads.

"AMD led the data center transition to mainstream 64-bit computing with AMD64, and with our ambidextrous strategy we will again lead the next major industry inflection point by driving the widespread adoption of energy-efficient 64-bit server processors based on both the x86 and ARM architectures," said Rory Read, president and chief executive officer, AMD. "Through our collaboration with ARM, we are building on AMD's rich IP portfolio, including our deep 64-bit processor knowledge and industry-leading AMD SeaMicro Freedom supercompute fabric, to offer the most flexible and complete processing solutions for the modern data center."

"The industry needs to continuously innovate across markets to meet customers' ever-increasing demands, and ARM and our partners are enabling increasingly energy-efficient computing solutions to address these needs," said Warren East, chief executive officer, ARM. "By collaborating with ARM, AMD is able to leverage its extraordinary portfolio of IP, including its AMD Freedom supercompute fabric, with ARM 64-bit processor cores to build solutions that deliver on this demand and transform the industry."

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The explosion of the data center has brought with it an opportunity to optimize compute with vastly different solutions. AMD is providing a compute ecosystem filled with choice, offering solutions based on AMD Opteron x86 CPUs, new server-class Accelerated Processing Units (APUs) that leverage Heterogeneous Systems Architecture (HSA), and new 64-bit ARM-based solutions.

This strategic partnership with ARM represents the next phase of AMD's strategy to drive ambidextrous solutions in emerging mega data center solutions. In March, AMD announced the acquisition of SeaMicro, the leader in high-density, energy-efficient servers. With this announcement, AMD will integrate the AMD SeaMicro Freedom fabric across its leadership AMD Opteron x86- and ARM-technology based processors that will enable hundreds, or even thousands of processor clusters to be linked together to provide the most energy-efficient solutions.

"Over the past decade the computer industry has coalesced around two high-volume processor architectures -- x86 for personal computers and servers, and ARM for mobile devices," observed Nathan Brookwood, research fellow at Insight 64. "Over the next decade, the purveyors of these established architectures will each seek to extend their presence into market segments dominated by the other. The path on which AMD has now embarked will allow it to offer products based on both x86 and ARM architectures, a capability no other semiconductor manufacturer can likely match."

At an event hosted by AMD in San Francisco, representatives from Amazon, Dell, Facebook and Red Hat participated in a panel discussion on opportunities created by ARM server solutions from AMD. A replay of the event can be found here as of 5 p.m. PDT, Oct. 29.

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About AMD

AMD ( NYSE : AMD ) is a semiconductor design innovator leading the next era of vivid digital experiences with its groundbreaking AMD Accelerated Processing Units (APUs) that power a wide range of computing devices. AMD's server computing products are focused on driving industry-leading cloud computing and virtualization environments. AMD's superior graphics technologies are found in a variety of solutions ranging from game consoles, PCs to supercomputers. For more information, visit http://www.amd.com.

AMD, the AMD Arrow logo and combinations thereof, are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. Other names are for informational purposes only and may be trademarks of their respective owners.

This release contains forward-looking statements, concerning among other things: AMD's strategy and future products, including the features and timing of production of these products, which are made pursuant to the safe harbor provisions of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements are commonly identified by words such as "would," "may," "expects," "believes," "plans," "intends," "projects," and other terms with similar meaning. Investors are cautioned that the forward-looking statements in these presentations are based on current beliefs, assumptions and expectations, speak only as of the date of these presentations and involve risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from current expectations. The material factors that could cause actual results to differ materially from current expectations include, without limitation, the following: that Intel Corporation's pricing, marketing and rebating programs, product bundling, standard setting, new product introductions or other activities may negatively impact our plans; that we may be unable to develop, launch and ramp new products and technologies in the volumes that are required by the market at mature yields on a timely basis; that our third party foundry suppliers will be unable to transition our products to advanced manufacturing process technologies in a timely and effective way or to manufacture our products on a timely basis in sufficient quantities and using competitive process technologies; that we will be unable to obtain sufficient manufacturing capacity or components to meet demand for our products or will not fully utilize our projected manufacturing capacity needs at GFs microprocessor manufacturing facilities; that our requirements for wafers will be less than the fixed number of wafers that we agreed to purchase from GF in 2012 or GF encounters problems that significantly reduce the number of functional die we receive from each wafer; that we are unable to successfully implement our long-term business strategy; that customers stop buying our products or materially reduce their operations or demand for our products; that we inaccurately estimate the quantity or type of products that our customers will want in the future or will ultimately end up purchasing, resulting in excess or obsolete inventory; that we are unable to manage the risks related to the use of our third-party distributors and add-in-board (AIB) partners or offer the appropriate incentives to focus them on the sale of our products; that we may be unable to maintain the level of investment in research and development that is required to remain competitive; that there may be unexpected variations in market growth and demand for our products and technologies in light of the product mix that we may have available at any particular time; that we will require additional funding and may be unable to raise sufficient capital on favorable terms, or at all; that global business and economic conditions will not improve or will worsen; that demand for computers will be lower than currently expected; and the effect of political or economic instability, domestically or internationally, on our sales or supply chain.

Because our actual results may differ materially from our plans and expectations today, we encourage you to review in detail the risks and uncertainties in our filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, including but not limited to the Quarterly Report on Form 10-Q for the quarter ended June 30, 2012.

Supporting Quotes from Industry Leaders

Dell

"With its planned 64-bit ARM solutions, AMD brings the experience of a proven enterprise CPU provider to the ARM ecosystem," said Jimmy Pike, vice president and senior fellow of the Dell Data Center Solutions group. "ARM has the promise of being a serious player in areas like web front-end servers and as a worker node in a Hadoop environment. AMD's opportunity is to deliver serious value in performance-per-dollar and performance-per watt-where low-power server platforms running massively scale out workloads can shine. The availability of 64-bit ARM solutions is an essential milestone needed to accelerate enterprise adoption of this technology."

HP

"In order to handle evolving workloads, business demands and the information explosion, enterprises are looking for flexible compute solutions that drive optimal performance and reduced energy consumption," said Paul Santeler, vice president and general manager, Hyperscale Business Unit, Industry Standard Servers and Software, HP. "As part of HP's Pathfinder Program, AMD and HP are continuing their decade-long relationship to innovate power-efficient computing with the development of a rich ecosystem of highly energy-efficient, dense server technology."

Red Hat

"The ecosystem for hyperscale computing is starting to take shape as workloads quickly evolve. Red Hat and AMD have been at the forefront of this movement, and today we are announcing our collaboration efforts to support the next-generation ARM-powered 64-bit architecture, ARMv8," said Jon Masters, Chief ARM Architect, Red Hat. "This is only the first step, and we're excited about sharing our enterprise Linux expertise with AMD and the ecosystem as they are striving to become a disruptive force for choice in the emerging ARM-based server market. As part of this effort, Red Hat's ARM team is looking forward to supporting AMD's processors in a future release of Fedora, our community-powered Linux distribution."