A little bit later than expected Advanced Micro Devices’ research and development center in Bangalore, India, has commenced operations, according to reports from the local media.

AMD Designs Chips in India

The AMD India Engineering Centre Private Limited will contribute to the design of future generations of AMD microprocessors. The standalone facility will occupy approximately 38 000 square-feet and will be located in the central business district of Bangalore. AMD is expected to hire 40 employees at the site this year, and by the end of 2005 expects the design center will house up to 150 experienced chip design and development engineers. Engineers at the design center will work closely with AMD’s engineering teams in the USA and will help define future microprocessor designs focused on meeting the evolving user needs in India and other high-growth markets.

“AMD’s business needs necessitate the establishment of an additional engineering team for our Computation Products Group. We believe that India is a key technology nexus in Southeast Asia, and an engineering presence in India strengthens our continued commitment to customer-centric innovation.” Gopal Krishna, general manager, engineering center, AMD India, told Channel Times web-site.

AMD plans to invest approximately $5 million over the next three years to establish the center and ramp up operations. The AMD India Engineering Centre Private Limited is a wholly owned subsidiary of Advanced Micro Devices. As a certified Software Technology Park of India facility, AMD is expected to benefit from government incentives, including exemptions from certain income and sales taxes and exemptions from import customs duty and taxes on capital goods.

Processors Unknown

AMD did not elaborate which chips are to be developed by the Indian R&D facility. AMD’s next-generations processors are K9, which is expected to be showcased in late 2005, and the K10, which is a totally unknown chip.

It was indicated in late 2003 that the first samples of AMD K9 will be released in the second half of 2005, 3.5 years after the AMD showcased its early K8 processors. Historically it took about three to four years to develop a micro-architecture of a desktop microprocessor, but the first indications of the K9 product development start belong to March 2003, right after the Opteron went into mass-production. AMD’s executives recently pointed toward a tight schedule for AMD K9 development process.

AMD is looking at adding multi-threading pattern into its future microprocessors in order to improve overall performance. Multi-core design would give a more substantial speed bump compared to that brought by technologies similar with Intel’s Hyper-Threading, it is generally believed.