Faced with the booming AI chip market, AMD announced layoffs of about 1,000 employees, accounting for about 4% of its global workforce. This move aims to bet on the AI chip field in a bid to gain a better position in the competition with NVIDIA. Essence The layoffs mainly involve sales and marketing positions in the gaming and consumer PC departments, reflecting the change in AMD's strategic focus and its emphasis on the AI market. Although AMD has made certain achievements in the fields of data centers and AI accelerators, in the face of NVIDIA's absolute leading position in the AI chip market, AMD urgently needs to adjust its strategies and concentrate resources to make breakthroughs.
Recently, AMD announced that it would cut about 1,000 employees, accounting for about 4% of its global workforce. The layoffs mainly involve sales and marketing positions in the gaming and consumer PC sectors, marking that the chip giant is fully turning to the field of artificial intelligence chips.
In the blue ocean market of AI chips, NVIDIA currently ranks as the leader with 80% of the market share. Analysts predict that the AI chip market will reach US$500 billion by 2028. AMD's resource restructuring is precisely to seize a larger share in this rapidly growing market.
As the world's second largest GPU manufacturer, AMD has shown strong strength in the fields of data centers and AI accelerators. Its latest AI chip, MI300X, has been favored by technology giants such as Meta and Microsoft, and has become an important choice outside of NVIDIA systems. However, AMD's stock price has fallen by 5% this year, while rival NVIDIA achieved a staggering 200% increase with its AI chip business, becoming the world's highest-capitalized company.
It is worth noting that the gaming business unit that once promoted AMD's growth is expected to suffer a heavy blow in 2024, with revenue likely to plummet by nearly 59%. The continued weakness in consumer demand has forced AMD to refocus its business.
Regarding the layoffs, an AMD spokesman said: "In order to focus resources on areas with the most growth potential, we have to make some difficult decisions. The company will treat affected employees with the greatest respect and provide them with a transition period. support."
Looking ahead, AMD plans to continue to increase investment in the AI field. CEO Lisa Su said the company has huge growth opportunities in its data center, AI and embedded chip businesses. AMD expects AI chip sales to reach $5 billion this year, accounting for about 20% of its expected total revenue.
This restructuring not only reflects AMD's strategic transformation, but also reflects the development trend of the entire technology industry: under the wave of AI, traditional businesses are gradually giving way to artificial intelligence-related fields. For AMD, whether it can successfully challenge NVIDIA's dominance in the AI chip market will be the key to future development.
AMD's strategic transformation reflects the overall trend of the technology industry under the AI wave. In the future, whether AMD can succeed in the field of AI chips will directly determine its future development prospects. This not only concerns AMD itself, but also affects the competitive landscape of the entire AI chip market.