AMD Channel Chief Richardson: ‘We’re Taking Market Share’

At XChange 2022, Richardson touts AMD’s growth as well as a new branding program that will emphasize its prowess beyond the gaming world, its continued focus on performance and ‘the importance of partnerships.’

AMD Channel Chief Terry Richardson

Terry Richardson doesn’t like to talk about his competitors, saying AMD’s financial numbers and market growth over the last several quarters speak for themselves.

Richardson, AMD’s North America channel chief, didn’t name the big three competitors—Intel, Nvidia and Qualcomm—but it’s clear the company is gunning for the No. 1 spot not only in the gaming segment but also is making a big push in the data center with its blazing line of EPYC processors. That push has helped the company achieve 70 percent year-over-year growth in its most recent quarter, despite heavy economic headwinds, Richardson said during a session at The Channel Company’s Xchange 2022 conference in Denver. The Channel Company is the parent of CRN.

“We’re proud of the growth but we know we still have a long way to go to achieve the goals that we have,” he said. “We’re pleased with the revenue acceleration. We’re growing way faster than the market, which mean we’re taking market share for the first time.”

Richardson noted that the data center business has grown 83 percent year over year, and the company’s client offerings market has grown 25 percent year over year. “Those markets aren’t growing anywhere near that fast,” he said. “I’m not here to talk about my competition in any way other than compare these results.”

AMD, while posting record results in its most recent quarterly earnings report, has warned that its next quarter would likely miss financial analyst forecasts as inflationary pressures and geopolitical strife grip every industry.

But Richardson believes the Santa Clara, Calif.-based company is in a good position to weather the storm and will focus on partnerships in its new branding campaign. AMD will soon embark on a media campaign called “Together We Advance,” which shows how AMD is working across various industries—not just gaming—to provide modern offerings. The 53-year-old company has earned a strong reputation as a performance leader, and Richardson said AMD wants to broaden that message. “You know, we‘re a company that’s probably been guilty of being very engineering-focused, very reliant upon our OEMs to drive the technology into the marketplace. But we haven’t been as focused on kind of getting the AMD name out there in a way that resonates with end-user customers, or even frankly, the broader general partner community.”

Richardson showed solution provider attendees a quick clip of a new video that will soon start hitting the market showing AMD’s gains in other areas.

“I really like ‘Together We Advance’ because it really kind of speaks to the importance of partnerships to your company,” Richardson said. “We fully recognize that our current structure doesn’t allow us to take this message to every end-user customer. So we desperately need partners like yourselves to understand … perhaps get excited and motivated to help people carry the message forward.”

Richardson noted that despite supply chain issues currently plaguing the industry, AMD’s EPYC components are ready to go. “For the builders in the audience, we do sell EPYC parts as component parts. So if you’re building your own systems or buying motherboards and other components and processors … they are existing in channel inventory.”

For solution providers like Dustin Davis, director of operations for Salt Lake City-based Nexus IT Consultants, Richardson’s message resonated. “We lean heavily on AMD for our products because of performance and affordability,” Davis said. “So it was really interesting to see what they have coming in the pipeline and how we can use that in our own business.”