News AMD's Radeon Technology Group is Reportedly Reducing Its Headcount in China

[Admin]

AMD is realigning workforce, possibly focusing on datacenter and AI operations.

AMD's Radeon Technology Group is Reportedly Reducing Its Headcount in China : Read more

 

[bit_user]

I think they probably do a lot of the physical layout, routing, and placement in China, as those are typically labor-intensive activities and China has traditionally been a low-cost market for skilled workers. Over the years, I'm sure engineering salaries there have crept up. Furthermore, much of this work is now becoming increasingly automated.

My sympathies to those employees affected. The economy in China isn't doing very well, lately. Hopefully, they can find jobs quickly. No matter what you think of geopolitics or trade relations between countries, it's still individual people's lives being upturned - that's not a good thing, no matter who or where they are.

Numerous professionals and experts in the GPU industry, nurtured in AMD's ecosystem, have become foundational pillars in China's burgeoning GPU companies. These talents play substantial roles in companies like Bitmain Technologies, TianShu ZhiXin, and more, bringing with them extensive experience and expertise from their tenures at AMD. Meanwhile, the American company is not in the business of nurturing rivals in China, especially if it involves leaking its own IP.

It's not only AMD. Nvidia, Intel, Qualcomm, and others have long had engineering workforces in mainland China. It's traditionally been an easy and inexpensive labor market for tech firms to grow their workforces. They have prioritized that above the long-term strategic threat of training up the competition. Plus, China has long played games around limiting access to their local markets, unless firms established local subsidiaries. Technology-transfer has been an openly-stated goal of such policies.

My own employer had an engineering office in Shanghai, until about 4 years ago. I'm sure the rising trade tensions played into their decision to close that office, but the strength of China's economy also factored into it. They lost their lease on their current office and the new location would've been too far for most existing employees to commute - I guess the real estate market was too hot for them to get anything closer? Meanwhile, our corporate overlords were leaning more in the direction of scaling up operations in India.

 

[Co BIY]

Amazing how they are operating with such a small global headcount. The productivity of modern corporations is amazing.

Any business with any global reach would be crazy to not be investing in a presence in India right now. The growth opportunities are what China was in the 80s -90s, likely with much more upside and less political risk.

Most businesses are running very lean in the USA, Europe and Japan because the high labor costs are long standing.

 

[bit_user]

Any business with any global reach would be crazy to not be investing in a presence in India right now. The growth opportunities are what China was in the 80s -90s, likely with much more upside and less political risk.

We've seen a lot of turnover and there's a lot of competition for good talent, there. Consequently, salaries aren't as cheap as they were in China. My data on this is very stale (pre-pandemic), but one datapoint I had was of Indian engineers making up to 70% of a US-based equivalent.

A funny story: one of our more recent Indian employees (as in, this year) was suspected of sub-contracting his work out to others. The quality wasn't great and dealing with him burnt lots of time & energy, as you might imagine.

As for political risk, it's definitely not on par with China, but not without issues. Press freedom, for one. Canada's presently dire relations with India highlights another set of issues. Yes, typically mild-mannered Canada. You'll have to read up on that, for the details.

Finally, don't think India is immune to its own protectionist tendencies.

India Delays Import Law That Halted Computer Shipments

Major PC makers set to restart shipments to India.

www.tomshardware.com

 

[digitalgriffin]

That is a very significant reduction. I know rtg isn't really as profitable for AMD. So shifting resources to AI makes sense. If these employees are working on Navi 41 (canceled) that would also make sense. (I'm not going to talk about political motivations or IP ramifications)

Either way it's not a good sign for things to come when it comes to GPUs. As much as I hate to say it "Come on Intel! Stay in the GPU race. This is your chance."

 

[bit_user]

As much as I hate to say it "Come on Intel! Stay in the GPU race. This is your chance."

I want to see Alchemist+ happen. I'm tempted by the 16 GB A770, but I'm put off by things like the high idle power. Therefore, I'm hoping their refresh finally launches and fixes that. They did recently introduce some new PCIe device IDs, so it looks like Alchemist+ could still be gestating.

 

[hannibal]

AMD profit margins are much much less than Nvidia has, so either has to cut expenses or increase prices... This is their way!
Intel is making no money at all with GPUs so... it is even worse. Either intel almost double the prices of Intel GPUs or give up... those are the two options for Intel...

 

[digitalgriffin]

AMD profit margins are much much less than Nvidia has, so either has to cut expenses or increase prices... This is their way!
Intel is making no money at all with GPUs so... it is even worse. Either intel almost double the prices of Intel GPUs or give up... those are the two options for Intel...

Amazon, Newegg, BestBuy and others wouldn't be around if it wasn't for the loss/break even models. It's a way to secure a dedicated customer base.

 

[bit_user]

Amazon, Newegg, BestBuy and others wouldn't be around if it wasn't for the loss/break even models. It's a way to secure a dedicated customer base.

True, but Intel's investors only have so much patience.

More importantly, Intel is famous for its model of trying a new business or market niche and then cutting its losses after a couple generations. The examples are almost too numerous to list. In this way, it acts sort of like a venture capital firm, where these various projects are treated sort of like startup companies. I don't know how explicit they are, in that thinking, but I suspect the location of their Silicon Valley headquarters has overexposed them to the VC mindset.

The idea seems to be to get in relatively early on the next massive growth opportunity, like AI. However, Intel wasn't first to make it big off AI - that's been Nvidia. Furthermore, if Nvidia had Intel's limited attention span, they'd have dropped AI just around the time it was starting to heat up!