AMD is set to make a major change in its manufacturing process in 2013 and will fully switch from the existing SOI manufacturing processor to 28nm Bulk CMOS process, according to Mark Papermaster, senior vice president and chief technology officer of AMD.
As for GPU manufacturing, AMD does not plan to make any changes. The current Southern Islands series already adopt Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company's (TSMC's) 28nm process, while its upcoming Sea Islands series will continue to adopt the same process. The Sea Islands series GPUs have already entered tape-out and should start manufacturing at the end of 2012 and will be announced in the first quarter of 2013.
Commenting about whether the Heterogeneous System Architecture (HSA) Foundation was formed to compete against Intel and Nvidia, Papermaster said that the company's cooperation with ARM is mainly to satisfy client demand for comprehensive functions and to allow quick product development, and is not founded to target any specific competitor.
As for market speculation whether AMD will launch ARM-based processors, Papermaster pointed out that the company's cooperation with ARM will only focus on the HAS Foundation and integration between APU and ARM TrustZone security technology.
In the future, in addition to its existing foundry partners, AMD does not rule out the possibility of cooperating with other foundry houses as long as they benefit AMD in product launches, Papermaster noted.
