Globalfoundries Archives - VR World

AMD, Analysis, Business, CPU, Event, Hardware, News

AMD Ships One Million Ryzen Processors for the Launch

During the official launch event in San Francisco, AMD revealed / confirmed rumors about their upcoming Ryzen family of processors. Focus seems to be on what seems to be “Intel-beating” Ryzen 7, their new top of the line processors. Ryzen 7 line-up consists solely out of 8 cores, 16 threads processors. A trio of fastest Ryzen models will launch globally on March 2, and according to Digitimes, the company prepared no less than one million processors for the launch itself. That one million is essentially consisted out of three models, plus the upcoming Ryzen 3 and 5 Series. In all fairness, it is weird to

AMD, Breaking, Graphics, Hardware, News, VR World

AMD Celebrates Vega 10 Rollout

AMD’s decision to rename and split the Northern Islands family into two is starting to unravel itself. Polaris 10 (Ellesmere) and 11 (Baffin) are coming to market as low-power mainstream cards – Radeon RX460 (Polaris 11), RX470, RX480 4GB and RX480 8GB (all Polaris 1o). On the other side, Greenland i.e. Vega 10 will be the most advanced silicon AMD has ever produced. Featuring 14nm FinFET design by GlobalFoundries or Samsung, with SK.Hynix HBM2 memory modules on multi-chip-module, i.e. MCM (TSMC calls this CoWoS), Vega 10 is looking to offer equal or higher performance than the high-end GP100. You should expect the chip to land in between

AMD, Breaking, E3, Entertainment, Gaming, Microsoft, News, Opinion, Sony, Virtual Reality (VR)

Microsoft Tick-Tock: Xbox One S and Project Scorpio

At it’s pre-E3 2016 conference, Microsoft announced the long awaited shift of its console model. In a nutshell, Xbox is becoming an regularly-refreshed product just like the Surface line of tablets and convertible PCs. Future Xbox refreshes will occur in an annual cycle, moving to a strategy that Intel used to call “Tick-Tock”. Just like Intel, Microsoft plans to release a high-end version of the console first, followed by a slimmed down version. Microsoft did not disclose the exact refresh cycle strategy, but we would not be surprised if the company decides to use E3 as the place where their annual or bi-annual refreshes will be announced. The exact

AMD, Breaking, Entertainment, Gaming, Hardware, News, Sony, Virtual Reality (VR)

Sony CEO Confirms High-End PlayStation Console for VR

Ever since we revealed the specifications of new PlayStation Neo console, rumors were about when SONY will pull the trigger and introduce the console. Our sources told us that the time of introduction is Tokyo Game Show – scheduled for September 15-17, 2016. As such, we’re afraid that the next week’s E3 will pass with perhaps just a teaser for the new console – or will be the biggest (silent) elephant in the room. In an interview with Financial Times, Andrew House, President and Global Chief Executive Offices at Sony Interactive Entertainment said that the high-end PlayStation 4 “Is intended to sit alongside and complement the standard PS4,

Breaking, Business, News, Samsung

Samsung to Manufacture Ultra Violet 7nm Chips in 2017

Even though we continuously hear rumors and statements that the pace of Moore’s Law is slowing down or stopping (last one came from Jen-Hsun Huang, co-founder and CEO Nvidia Corporation), the speed of progress in semiconductor industry isn’t slowing down. 14nm is getting traction not just by high-end chips from Intel, AMD, Nvidia, Apple, Samsung and other large players, but also by smaller companies which are moving to revolutionize the way how we build virtual reality glasses, cars, infotainment systems, TVs and many other. FinFET transistors are moving to replace Planar, resistive memory technologies such as ReRAM plan to succeed NAND Flash and SDRAM etc. Still, there is one major technology barrier we

AMD, Apple, Breaking, Business, CPU, Hardware, Intel, News, Nvidia, Samsung

TSMC Tapes out 10nm A11 Processors for Apple

Ten years, even five years ago Intel was the undisputed process leader, and if you wanted to see how the new process node would look like, you would wait to see a new processor coming from Intel architecture. That was the unwritten law of the semiconductor industry, with an occasional blimp when TSMC would introduce a half-node step, beating Intel’s 90/65/45/32nm with 80nm, 55nm, 40nm and 28nm GPUs for ATI and Nvidia. Today, Intel’s missed approach to mobile resulted in company loosing the process node advantage, and ultimately being forced to cancel the most of Atom product family. And now, to add insult to injury, DigiTimes (also known

AMD, Breaking, Computex Taipei, Gaming, Graphics, Hardware, News

AMD Polaris 10 GPU Specifications Revealed?

A technology rumor website recently published a story detailing the upcoming AMD Polaris 10 GPU, allegedly named “67DF:C4”. As it turns out, a bird sent us screenshots showing the details of the card. While we cannot go into more details in order to protect the source, we can confirm that AMD Polaris 10 engineering samples are varying in clock between 800 and 1050 MHz, depending on the partner. Our original Polaris 10 story is here. What we know so far is that Polaris 10 used to be known as Ellesmere, Baffin is Polaris 11 and Greenland is Vega 10. Apparently, the numbers 10, 11, 12 will not co-relate

AMD, Breaking, CPU, Enterprise, Exclusive, News

AMD ZEN CPU and APU Specs Confirmed?

It looks like 2016 is turning into a year of anticipation and redemption for AMD, not just to its consumers, but also to customers which purchased millions of dollars of AMD hardware in the past, and then felt left out. We all saw Oak Ridge National Laboratories, one of first Opteron adopters – ditching a decade old AMD collaboration for IBM+NVIDIA team up. Luckily for all involved, AMD seems to have finally “get their s*** together” and started a sales campaign which might be the most successful since Henri Richard led the sales team taking over more than 50% market share from Intel (albeit only in 4P and 8P

Analysis, Breaking, CPU, Hardware

Next Gen Processor Performance Revealed

There is a trend of large companies snapping up smaller chip designers, all at the time when several next=generation processor designers are starting to exit stealth modes and gain traction. Over the last couple of months, companies such as Amazon, Apple, Google, Microsoft, Oracle – all have acquired at least one promising hardware designer or manufacturer. Soft Machines is one of the ‘new kids on the silicon block’, planning to do a ‘one up’ and build all-new processing architecture. Variable Instruction Set Computing or VISC is their brainchild, and on paper, we’re talking about a seriously efficient and flexible processor architecture which just may take sweep the rug

AMD, Graphics, Hardware, News, Rumors

AMD GPUs to Come from GlobalFoundries and TSMC?

AMD received a substantial coverage at VentureBeat recently, with Dean Takahashi interviewing key executives in succession. First off was an in-depth interview with Lisa Su (CEO and Chairman of AMD), followed by an interview with Raja Koduri, Head (CEO?) of Radeon Technologies Group. RTG is AMD’s spin-off which you can compare with the spin-off of manufacturing division you now know as GlobalFoundries, just without a strong sovereign wealth fund (like Mubadala Development Company)… for now. In order to execute on a huge market opportunity in the form of Virtual Reality, RTG wants to make sure all the basics are covered. For starters, one of more painful episodes from the company

3D, AMD, Augmented Reality (AR), Breaking, Companies, Graphics, Hardware, Intel, News, Nvidia, Virtual Reality (VR), VR World

14nm AMD Greenland tapes out: Attack on NVIDIA Pascal, Intel Xeon Phi

Couple of days ago, GlobalFoundries issued a press release stating that they ‘demonstrated silicon success on the first AMD (NASDAQ: AMD) products using GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ most advanced 14nm FinFET process technology.’ “FinFET technology is expected to play a critical foundational role across multiple AMD product lines, starting in 2016. GLOBALFOUNDRIES has worked tirelessly to reach this key milestone on its 14LPP process. We look forward to GLOBALFOUNDRIES’ continued progress towards full production readiness and expect to leverage the advanced 14LPP process technology across a broad set of our CPU, APU, and GPU products,” said Mark Papermaster, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at Advanced Micro Devices.

AMD, Hardware, Internet of Things (IoT), News, Technology Security

GlobalFoundries Launches 22nm FD-SOI Process for IoT, Wearables

Since its inception, GlobalFoundries had a plan to become world’s leading semiconductor manufacturer. From starting as an AMD manufacturing spin-off, the company owners set a multi-decade plan which involved acquiring Chartered Semiconductor and recently, acquired IBM foundry business as well. The capacity grew from initial 60,000 300mm wafers in 2009 to almost quarter billion 300mm and 130+ million 200mm wafers in second quarter of 2015. While the absolute capacity numbers were even higher, the owners (Mubadala Development Company, Abu Dhabi) decided to re-address the capacity and increase volume in processes that make financial sense. In order to stay ahead the company kept on investing in SOI

2015, Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Event, Exclusive, Hardware, VR World

3D Printing Electronics is a Reality Now: Meet Voxel8

Electronics manufacturing is a very labor-intensive process, employing a combination of robotic and chemical processes and treatments, manual labor but above all – it is a very dislocated process. Over the course of past 15 years, we managed to witness the manufacturing changed in its scale, employing tens of millions of people and massively reducing time to market. Still, the process takes a lot of time, and not all can be done as efficiently as possible. There are two base components of any piece of electronic equipment on the market: chip and PCB (Printed Circuit Board) and revolution is coming to both: IBM / GlobalFoundries

VR World

John Docherty’s Switching Gears from AMD to GlobalFoundries Benefits Both

AMD’s SVP jumps ship to GlobalFoundries is a win-win situation?

Business, VR World

IBM Disappoints in Q3 2014 Earnings, Abandons Promised 2015 Profit Target

IBM has reported less-than-stellar 3Q 2014 earnings, characterized by its CEO as “disappointing.” Will Big Blue’s new focus on the cloud be the silver lining?

Analysis, Business, VR World

IBM, GlobalFoundries to Strike $1.5B Deal

IBM will reportedly pay GlobalFoundries to take over its chipmaking division in exchange for access to intellectual property.

Analysis, Business, Mobile Computing, VR World

Qualcomm's Bill Davidson Goes to Globalfoundries

One of Qualcomm’s most senior and pivotal employees has been snatched up by the fab company Globalfoundries after spending 12 years with the company. Bill Davidson has been a investor relations and global marketing executive at Qualcomm for the past seven years, last assuming the role of SVP of Qualcomm Investor Relations, SVP of Strategy and Operations for Global Market Devlepment-QTI. QTI is Qualcomm’s biggest business unit, accounting for almost all of the company’s non-licensing revenues and profit. Davidson has been one of the pivotal figures inside Qualcomm over the past 12 years at the company, and his departure surely comes as a surprise to many.

Business, Enterprise, Hardware, VR World

GlobalFoundries Applauded for Job Creation

In the five years since GlobalFoundries broke ground in Malta, Saratoga County, New York for their Fab 8, they have exceeded their promise of job creation in the community. Instead of its initial projection of 1,200 new jobs, the company is responsible for approximately 2,400, including construction of the Technology Development Center on its existing 223 acre campus. The direct jobs have a trickle down effect resulting in 3,000 indirect jobs according to a study by Dr. Everett Ehrlich, business economist. GlobalFoundries also made a capital investment of $6.9 billion, plus the building of the new Technology Development Center which increases that number by $2.1

Analysis, Business, Graphics, Hardware, VR World

AMD Reports Expected Improvement in Q1 2014 Earnings

After Intel reported their earnings for the first quarter of 2014, many people expected AMD’s earnings to mirror that of Intel’s or to do worse. Well, by the looks of it, AMD’s earnings have mirrored that of Intel’s in terms of remaining fairly stable and ensuring that their core business is strong. AMD reported a net loss of $20 million (or a non-GAAP profit of $12 million) on $1.4 billion in revenue which translates to a loss per share of about $0.02 or a non-GAAP profit per share of about $0.02. Wall Street’s estimates for AMD’s non-GAAP earnings were at an EPS of $0.00 and

Business, Hardware, VR World

Samsung and Globalfoundries Collaborate on 14nm FinFET

Samsung and Globalfoundries have announced a partnership to collaborate on a global scale to deliver 14nm FinFET technology to their customers. This partnership is different from the already existing Common Platform Alliance which includes Globalfoundries, Samsung and IBM, but is likely a product of that relationship considering that IBM is mostly a research fab and doesn’t really produce many commercial wafers. This 14nm FinFET collaboration is an effort by both companies to build up enough fab capacity in order to satisfy the demand of their customers on this leading-edge technology. As you can see from the slide above Samsung and Globalfoundries’ partnership means that the