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Comment by observr | Hacker News Reader

Thanks to Jim Keller.

That's a common misperception. Michael Clark played a larger role in Ryzen: https://venturebeat.com/2016/08/24/how-amd-designed-what-cou...

Iirc Jim Keller's title was VP and chief of the microprocessor division. So he was probably more of a technical manager anyway. I believe Suzanne Plummer and Mike Clark were project directors so they'd be more hands on anyway

Sure but also thanks to a few patents having expired, especially that one about hyper threading[1].

edit:

https://patents.google.com/patent/US3728692A/en

https://patents.google.com/patent/US3771138

[1] Should have said simultaneous multithreading (SMT) instead of hyper threading which is specific to Intel.

Weren't those patents part of the AMD-Intel cross licensing deal or are there some x86 CPU related patents that are kept separate?

Those are 1971 IBM patents.

It would be interesting to know anything more on the AMD/Intel agreements than the vague "x86 cross licensing" though for sure.

https://www.zdnet.com/article/intel-and-amd-settle-agree-cro...

https://www.sec.gov/Archives/edgar/data/2488/000119312509236...

The first will be a quicker read than the second ;). The other commenter mentioned SMT was an IBM patent rather than an Intel one, so that's probably the answer to my question. It seems weird that they wouldn't have just licensed that from IBM as well.

The IBM patents have been expired for decades though. There's nothing to licence.

But that SEC link is awesome; I though the agreement was completely confidential and we'd only ever see it in a historical context. Thanks!

Before Ryzen, AMD's CPUs were relying on Cluster-based Multithreading (CMT). you can read more about CMT vs SMT here

https://scalibq.wordpress.com/2012/02/14/the-myth-of-cmt-clu...

And he has decided to join Intel.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16933931

He did just quit Tesla after a short time there and re-joined Intel.

He was the architect of Ryzen.

I'm aware.

I have been watching the dynamics between AMD and Intel recently and some interesting things are happening. Jim Keller and Raja headed to Intel. Intel announcing plans to get into the discrete GPU space (a place ridden with patent landmines). The KabyLake chip released with Intel CPU + AMD GPU. Wonder if the companies are aligning to work closely to counter NVidia or if something else entirely is at play.

> Wonder if the companies are aligning to work closely to counter NVidia

I mean, yeah, that's actively happening, as can also be seen by the Intel/Vega combo.

And Lisa Su.

Agreed. Su had the smarts to get a performant chip made and hire the people to make it happen. You don't get market share with an also-ran offering.

Didn't Rory Read hire them and start the projects?

I thought Read was a placeholder CEO who was installed to conduct cost cutting. But you're right - a quick google search confirmed that Keller was hired during Read's tenure.

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