Management Strategy and Analysis 

2009 marks AMD's 40th anniversary as a semiconductor industry innovator that designs and markets products and platforms to enable the next-generation of technology solutions at work, home, and play. With the close of our Asset Smart transactions, we continue transforming AMD into a stronger, more agile innovation engine.

We have established a systematic approach to managing the risks and opportunities associated with changing market and business conditions in our core areas of business.  We leverage our engagement with a variety of stakeholders to help set a strategic course that includes innovative products and an unwavering commitment to our customers.

• Risk Management
• Public Policy
• Product Innovation
• Stakeholder Engagement
• Supply Chain Management
• Quality Management

Corporate Strategy Discussion

The world is undergoing a fundamental shift from focusing on raw performance to a sharper focus on value.  We are well positioned to benefit because, in our business, 'when you think value, you think AMD.'  User experiences are no longer defined solely by the speed of technology but by how well the overall system performs on the most relevant workloads and usage models. 

"Only two companies in the world develop and deliver x86 microprocessors in volume. Only two companies in the world deliver leading-edge 3D graphics. Only AMD does both."
- Dirk Meyer, AMD president and CEO

We believe the future is about platforms and we are uniquely positioned to combine our technology assets to deliver a superior user experience. Although today's users want mobility, many do not want to sacrifice the full-feature PC experience. AMD collaborated with HP to develop a notebook platform for the ultrathin market that offers a feature-rich experience at an affordable price. The HP Pavilion dv2 Entertainment Notebook PC was launched to industry accolades and received a CES Best of Show from Laptop Magazine earlier this year. In 2009, we plan to double the number of platforms we deliver year-over-year.

Regardless of the form factor, today's user demands an experience that is visually-rich and media intensive.  In 2008, we combined two ATI Radeon HD 4800 series Graphics Processing Units (GPUs) with an advanced cross-GPU connection to create a more scalable architecture that delivers greater power efficiency and higher frame rates. In 2009, we plan to introduce even higher performing integrated solutions.

Today's data centers are moving to consolidation and cloud computing to improve their hardware utilization and energy-efficiency to reduce costs. With innovations designed to deliver leading virtualization and power capabilities, our Quad-Core AMD Opteron™ processor introduced in 2008 offers improved performance in workloads that matter most to our customers. In June 2009, we launched the industry's first x86 six-core processor for 2-, 4-, and 8-socket servers, the Six-Core AMD Opteron.  This new processor is designed to offer a substantial performance leap compared to our Quad-Core AMD Opteron.  With the same socket infrastructure, customers with existing Opteron processors will essentially drop-in the Six-Core Opteron processor, load a new BIOS and upgrade their dual- or quad-core servers to six cores, thereby dramatically increasing the utilization of their data center.