Reporting by XinZhiyuan
Edit: David
The digging war of the red and blue factories continues, and this time it is Intel that has the upper hand, and they successfully poached Rohit Verma, the chief Radeon independent GPU architect of AMD. However, this elder brother is also an "old comrade-in-arms" of Intel's current CEO.
Since ancient times, red and blue have loved and killed each other!
Entering 2022, the talent battle between AMD and Intel continues, and this time it is the blue side that has the upper hand.
Recently, Intel poached Rohit Verma, AMD's chief Radeon independent GPU architect.
Verma is a senior researcher at AMD. Being able to recruit this person is undoubtedly an important victory for Intel.
According to Rohit Verma's personal Linkedin homepage, he has been working at AMD for a long time until January this year, serving at AMD for more than 8 years. Chief SoC architect who has worked on projects such as discrete GPUs.
Before AMD, he worked for Intel and was the chief SoC architect. The term of office began in 1999 and lasted 14 years.
Semi Analysis analyst Dylan Patel brought Rohit Verma's major career transition to our attention.
Prior to becoming a Senior Fellow and Lead SoC Architect for AMD Discrete GPUs (3 years and 3 months), Verma served as an AMD Researcher and Lead SoC Architect in the Semi-Custom Business Unit (4 years and 11 months).
During his more than eight-year career at AMD, Verma worked on projects ranging from discrete graphics cards for desktops and laptops to broader SoC architecture divisions involving CPUs, GPUs, fabrics, power management, and security.
On Linkedin, Rohit Verma also tweeted that she was excited about her return to Intel.
"I'm excited to share with you that I've joined Intel to lead the product architecture of standalone GPU SoCs in visual computing. It's a pleasure to be back at Intel, and I look forward to working with the team to define and build innovative next-generation GPU products!"
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Interestingly, Rohit Verma's 15-year career at Intel overlaps considerably with that of current Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger.
Gelsinger joined Intel in 1979 as an 18-year-old quality control technician. When Verma began his career at Intel in 1999, Gelsinger served as General Manager of Intel's Desktop Products Division and became Intel's first CTO in 2001.
Pat Gelsinger returned to Intel as the new CEO in 2021, ushering in a rather turbulent period.
With his broad vision and understanding of the dramatic changes needed to achieve his vision, Gelsinger recruited some of the "old teams" he worked with long ago.
Rohit Verma should be one of them.
This kind of thinking is very common, when everything around you is changing, you need to rely on others, and recruiting new people often requires a long run-in period, it is better to directly find familiar, trustworthy old acquaintances.
Especially if this person is still a senior technical talent who is the biggest opponent, it is even better. Not to mention his contribution to Intel's roadmap to Arc GPUs.
One quote from Gelsinger may aptly sum up the situation at Intel in 2022 — "We've been through brain drain, but now that's changed and our brains' are back."
Resources:
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intel-poaches-amd-lead-radeon-discrete-gpu-architect
https://www.tomshardware.com/news/intels-pat-gelsinger-on-super-moores-law-making-multi-billion-dollar-bets