Advanced Micro Devices: Life beyond Intel

AMD was established in 1969, by Jerry Sanders [previously Director (Worldwide Marketing) at Fairchild Semiconductor¹] along with seven others with a capital of $1,00,000. They identified their mission as 'building a semiconductor company that offered products for electronic communication, computation and instrumentation manufacturers' (Refer Exhibit III for a brief note on the semiconductor industry). AMD began operating from a room in a co-founder's (John Carey) apartment, shifting later on to a full-fledged office in Sunnyvale, California, which became its headquarters. Initially, the company produced alternate source devices, that is, they obtained products from other companies and redesigned them to function more efficiently at greater speeds.

In 1970, AMD had 53 employees and launched 18 different products along with its first proprietary product, the Am2501 chip. In 1972, AMD became a publicly traded company and in 1973, it established its first overseas manufacturing facility in Penang, Malaysia. By 1974, AMD had made more than 200 different products and the number of employees had increased to 1500. The company posted $26.5 million in annual sales for the same year. In 1975, AMD launched the 8080A standard processors and introduced the AM2900 processor line. The company posted revenues of $ 168 million in the financial year 1974-75. Intel had become a formidable name in the industry by now. Not only were both the companies started by ex-Fairchild employees, they were operating essentially in the same business...