AMD will lay off nearly 1,000, or 4% of staff, as AI competition heats up

AMD said today it will lay off 4% of its global staff, or perhaps somewhat less than 1,000 of its estimated 26,000-person workforce.

The cuts come at a time when AMD has been soundly beating Intel in the x86 processor market. But AMD has also been second in the transition from graphics processing units (GPUs) to AI accelerators in competition with AI chip market giant Nvidia.

AMD said through a spokesperson, ″As a part of aligning our resources with our largest growth opportunities, we are taking a number of targeted steps that will unfortunately result in reducing our global workforce by approximately 4%. We are committed to treating impacted employees with respect and helping them through this transition.”

In an SEC filing last year, AMD said it had 26,000 employees. Today, AMD said only that the number of layoffs would be under 1,000.

AMD’s stock has fallen this year while Nvidia’s is up around 200%, turning it into the most valuable public company in the world with a market cap of $3.6 trillion. AMD’s market value is $227 billion.

AMD said in October it expects $5 billion in AI chip sales this year, about a fifth of the $25.7 billion. AMD has a stronghold in processors/GPUs for game consoles, but that market has been weaker than expected in this generation, partly due to the pandemic supply shortages for the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S.

But Mercury Research reports that AMD’s share of processors against Intel is 34% now, up dramatically from years ago. Jon Peddie, an analyst at Jon Peddie Research, was surprised at the layoffs. In a message to GamesBeat, he said, “AMD had a good quarter — but not quite as good as some of the Wall Street sharp shooters, who, after all, is who we all work for and worry about — thought they should have had. AMD didn’t seem over burdened headcount wise, and this is a really crappy time to have to lay someone off.” He suggested they could have waited a couple of months.