AMD partners with Samsung to bring its graphics prowess to low-power chipsets

AMD has partnered with Samsung in a move that will allow it to get back into the mobile market with its graphics processors. The company sold off its Imageon division to Qualcomm in 2009.

João Carrasqueira Senior Editor for Europe Neowin @indospot · Jun 3, 2019 12:44 EDT with 3 comments

Nowadays, you might not think of AMD to have any notable presence in the smartphone market, but years ago, the company owned Imageon, a division responsible for developing graphics products for ultra-low-power mobile devices. AMD eventually sold Imageon off to Qualcomm in 2009, who renamed the products to use the Adreno branding.

Ten years later, it seems that AMD wants to get back into the mobile market, and it's doing so in the form of a partnership with Samsung. The partnership, announced today (via Engadget), sees Samsung licensing Radeon-based graphics technology from AMD for use in mobile devices, including smartphones. The solutions will be based on the newly-announced RDNA architecture, thanks to its high scalability.

Samsung's Inyup Kang, president of the System LSI division, commented on the deal between the two companies, saying:

“As we prepare for disruptive changes in technology and discover new opportunities, our partnership with AMD will allow us to bring groundbreaking graphics products and solutions to market for tomorrow’s mobile applications(...). We look forward to working with AMD to accelerate innovations in mobile graphics technologies that will help take future mobile computing to the next level.”

AMD has plenty of experience in developing graphics processors, so its return to the mobile market could give Samsung's chipsets an advantage over its competitors'. It's currently unclear when we can expect products with these technologies to be available to the public.