AMD said hiring to add Android support, no threat to iPad
A slip detailing Computex show launch plans may have given away AMD's plans to get into Android in earnest. Industry contacts claimed AMD has been recruiting engineers to write Android drivers. The move is likely the first step …
Context & Ripple Effects
The hiring report lands three months after AMD's chief executive exited amid what a company source described as board frustration that he wasn't moving fast enough into the exploding mobile chip market — so an Android driver recruitment push reads as the new direction taking shape rather than a side project. It also follows a year of positioning toward Apple: AMD was reported in advanced discussions to supply chips to Apple as far back as April 2010, and had already shipped over a million accelerated processing units for entry-level notebooks and netbooks by January 2011.
The Electronista report itself is thin on confirmation — industry contacts, not AMD, describe the recruiting — but the framing matters: any Android push is cast as no threat to the iPad, with Android's momentum instead depicted as bearing down on Research In Motion. That positions AMD's likely Computex play at the low end of the tablet and netbook market, against ARM-based handset and tablet vendors rather than Apple.
First-order effects
- If the driver-engineering hires are real, AMD's Fusion-class APUs become candidates for Android tablets and smartbooks that could surface as Computex 2011 announcements, giving OEMs an x86 option in an Android market otherwise dominated by ARM licensees.
Second-order effects
- ARM-based tablet silicon vendors would face price competition from x86 parts chasing the same Android designs, while AMD's Windows-centric PC partners gain a hedge against netbook demand shifting to tablets.
Third-order effects
- With the CEO departure already signaling that the board sees mobile as existential, a sustained Android effort points toward x86 vendors treating operating-system portability — not Windows exclusivity — as baseline strategy for PC silicon.
The trend: PC chipmakers are hedging beyond Windows into Android as tablets erode the low-end notebook market they were built for.