One of the most interesting revelations of recent days has been the mention of Chinese clones of AMD processors with the first generation Zen architecture. Samples of Hygon server processors, structurally identical to EPYC processors in Socket SP3, were by American journalists at the Computex 2019 exhibition, and the processors of this brand as part of a Chinese workstation in detailed photos by members of the ChipHell forum. One got the impression that the Chinese "processor building" is striding by leaps and bounds towards future success. Moreover, the poetic "epigraph" on the covers of these processors described approximately such perspectives.
Chinese processors: our days
These revelations made it possible to establish several facts. Firstly, AMD's Chinese partners did not bother themselves with reworking the Zen processor architecture, and in the case of server versions of processors, they even copied the design of Socket SP3, only adding support for their own data encryption standards in order to meet the national interests of China. In the case of Hygon processors for workstations, there were more differences with desktop Ryzen: first of all, BGA processors were mounted directly on the motherboard, and the lack of a βdiscreteβ set of system logic was explained by the presence of the necessary functional blocks inside the processor itself, but this is also Chinese "clones" did not differ from the American versions of Ryzen for embedded solutions.
Secondly, the production of 14-nm Hygon processors with AMD Zen architecture could be entrusted to GlobalFoundries, which has specialized enterprises in the US and Germany. This is convenient both from the point of view of unification and simply for economic reasons: the transfer of someone else's development to the conveyor of one of the Chinese "silicon forges" would be an event not only protracted and risky, but also expensive. And we could already see that the Chinese, in cooperation with AMD, tried to act with maximum cost savings: at the stage of concluding the deal, future payments to the American partner were limited to $293 million, moreover, it was divided into several quarters, and actually came to AMD gradually. For example, in the first quarter of this year, the company received only $60 million from Chinese partners. In the future, royalties from each "clone" sold inside China should be added to license payments, but it is too early to judge the degree of full-flow of this financial flow, because the supply of Hygon processors is only are gaining momentum.
By the way, AMD itself did not spend much effort on participating in this joint venture. She granted the Chinese the rights to use the first generation x86-compatible Zen processor architecture, and in return received guarantees of license payments as the Chinese partners reach certain milestones. In fact, AMD specialists did not even help their Chinese colleagues much - most of the engineering work was done on the side of the latter.
Train AMD will go to a brighter future without Chinese passengers
Site brought stunning news from Computex 2019: as it turns out, AMD will not grant the Chinese side the right to create processors with Zen architecture of the second or subsequent generations. They will be able to release their processors with the first generation Zen architecture, but the terms of the deal in 2016 do not provide for any further development.
AMD CEO Lisa Su did not elaborate on whether the decision to limit cooperation with Chinese developers is a direct result of trade disputes between the US and China, but she previously acknowledged that AMD is forced to comply with the requirements of the US legislation in determining their relationship with partners.
At the same time, it became known that AMD did not plan to allow the Chinese side to release desktop processors that would become direct analogues of Ryzen. The initial terms of the transaction in 2016 did not provide for the release of such products. It cannot be argued that without further development of cooperation with AMD, China will be left without x86-compatible processors. Formally, the Chinese have a joint venture with the Taiwanese VIA Technologies, which develops processors for Zhaoxin Semiconductor. And so far there is no reason to believe that US pressure on Chinese opponents will extend to contracts with Taiwanese allies.
Source: 3dnews.ru