The Hindu Business Line : Undaunted by size

AMD is trying to level the playing field in its race against chipmaker Intel. That is not easy going, but AMD has seen widespread acknowledgement, adoption and, even, some pull in the marketplace. eWorld spoke to AMD on what it is doing to get a handle on the market.

AMD's Country Manager, Ajay Keskar, says the company has secured OEM wins, put in place a substantial reseller network and is now seeing traction from the government market, large installations and cluster adoptions. The corporate market is now the focus for AMD and "we are working through our OEM partnerships as well as directly with end-use customers to make a dent in the market," he says.

Despite Intel dominating the market inside and outside India, AMD finds that India, Asia and Latin America are the biggest growth engines for this $2.7 billion Sunnyvale, California-based chipmaker. If the race were only to the swift, AMD at least has a chance with its Athlon 64, having come of age in the 64-bit computing space, but Intel's 80 per cent market share globally is hard to argue with.

In September, the Athlon-64 debuted - a microprocessor aimed at the strategic gap in Intel's line - between the Intel Xeon which used 32-bit technology and its Itanium 64 that used 64-bit technology but needed new or rewritten software - where the Opteron caters to the server market and the Athlon 64 to the desktop market.

The high-end Athlon grabbed nearly a tenth of the market share in India, with 56,942 shipments in the fourth quarter of 2002 and the share steadying at around 8 per cent with 92,283 shipments of the Athlon in the first half of this financial year. Th K6/Duron processor too is getting and keeping a significant part of AMD's market share - estimated by IDC at 10-12 per cent in India. AMD's growth is a significant 25-30 per cent, even if on a smaller base.

The Athlon is especially suited for digital media applications space and gaming, according to AMD, and a number of recent wins for AMD in India have been in this space.

Enterprise market

"When we first came to India neither the OEMs nor end-use customers even considered using AMD,'' says Keskar. That has changed in the two-and-a-half years since AMD entered the Indian market. In fact, AMD is now keen on targeting the enterprise segment - which is where the action is. The company has entered into partnerships with major Indian and MNC OEMs to offer the AMD microprocessor on their servers, desktops and laptops. For instance HP, HCL, Wipro, Acer, Zenith and Vintron are among the ones offering the AMD processor on their commercial and consumer desktops, servers and PCs.

Globally, Sun recently announced it was planning a server with the AMD Opteron, the second of the top four server makers, after IBM, to do so. For a company that has been ahead of its rivals, Intel not excepted, on chip innovation, this OEM support is not surprising. What is surprising though, is that it has taken so long for the chipmaker to focus on corporates in India.

"We have spent the time since entering the Indian market in addressing customer perceptions and increasing visibility," says Rahul Singh, Marketing Manager. Focussed so far on the small office home office (SOHO) segment - with considerable success - AMD is now ready to address the corporate market, he says. "We are also targeting end-customers through educating CIOs and decision-makers, increased visibility and participation in various industry events and fora," Keskar says.

Figuring on the list

As the computerisation of and technology adoption by government departments proceeds apace, AMD is trying to get on the specification list - alongside Intel. Getting government bodies to issue neutral tenders was in itself a huge task, recalls Keskar. Earlier, tenders from government departments would routinely specify Intel chips in their requirements.

"It works both ways,'' says Singh: OEMs needed to see the demand for AMD processors before they offered the option to customers and customers needed to see the supply first, before considering AMD.

Getting AMD on the requirement list by government tenders involved persuading Government officials to try and test the AMD processors, their capabilities and their competitiveness vis-à-vis Intel.

"We worked with state and Central governments and government agencies that define specifications and seeding and evaluation systems," says Rahul Singh. The effort also had to address compatibility, performance and reliability issues. AMD believes its processors can match the performance by Intel's processors and best them on price. The States of Maharashtra, Goa and the Directorate-General of Supplies and Distribution etc are among those that published neutral tenders recently and in which AMD participated, says Keskar. All said and done, when the chips are down, it should be about performance and price, the company would like to say.

priya@thehindu.co.in

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