Advanced Micro Devices, the world’s second largest supplier of x86 microprocessors, said Thursday that it would continue to gain market share throughout 2008 despite of the incoming competition from Intel Corp. with the new micro-architecture. The company said it would aggressively offer competitive solutions not only for high-end consumers, but also for those, who seek for more affordable systems.

Phil Hester, who is in charge of technology at AMD, is reported to have said that the chipmaker would focus heavily on “chips for PCs below $1000 over the next few years”, which may indicate AMD’s further commitment to gain unit market share x86. The firm also confirmed that it plans to increase its microprocessor market share to 33% while a meeting with analysts.

“It’s the right thing to do and it’s a great business opportunity for us. We believe if we don’t start now we will not get the solutions the market wants in the next two or three years,” said Mr. Hester, according to CNN Money.

Earlier AMD already claimed about probability to ship one third, or 33%, of x86 microprocessors worldwide by 2008 – 2009 timeframe, however it was not clear whether the chipmaker would be able to ship so many chips shortly enough. Now that AMD has introduced plans to upgrade its Fab 30 (by improving it and call it Fab 38) and increase performance of the Fab 36, the firm is likely to boost its manufacturing capacities by three times from now.

According Mercury Research, AMD increased its market share of the overall x86 chip market to 21.4% versus Intel’s 76.9% as of the end of 2005.