AMD's record quarter: Data center business doubles, while gaming craters

AMD reported third-quarter revenues on Tuesday with a record $13.4 billion, an increase of 45 percent year over year, as data center business nearly doubled and the company’s gaming segment cratered. AMD CFO Jean Hu said, “We expect revenue to be approximately $17 billion, plus or minus 3%. The middle point of our guidance represents approximately 66% year-over-year revenue growth, primarily driven by the acceleration of our Data Center segment.”

AMD 周二公布第三季度营收达到创纪录的 134 亿美元，同比增长 45%，这得益于数据中心业务几乎翻了一番，而游戏部门则大幅下滑。AMD 首席财务官 Jean Hu 表示：“我们预计营收约为 170 亿美元，上下浮动 3%。我们业绩指引的中点代表了约 66% 的同比增长，这主要得益于我们数据中心业务的加速增长。”

AMD says its Q4 revenue projections are up another 27 percent from this quarter’s results. As reported by Tom’s Hardware, Intel’s Q4 guidance places revenue estimates between $15 billion and $16 billion. That means that if both companies land where they expect to at the end of the fourth quarter, AMD would exceed Intel’s revenue for the first time in history.

AMD 表示，其第四季度营收预期较本季度业绩将再增长 27%。据 Tom’s Hardware 报道，英特尔的第四季度业绩指引预计营收在 150 亿至 160 亿美元之间。这意味着如果两家公司都能达到第四季度末的预期目标，AMD 的营收将历史上首次超过英特尔。

The data center segment of AMD’s business was up 97 percent year over year, with a record $8.5 billion. AMD attributes the growth to demand for its EPYC line of enterprise server CPUs, along with the launch of the Instinct MI450 series GPUs. Sales of AMD Ryzen mobile chips led growth in the Client business, which includes desktop Ryzen processors and posted $2.95 billion in revenue, up 7 percent year over year.

AMD 的数据中心业务同比增长 97%，达到创纪录的 85 亿美元。AMD 将这一增长归因于对其 EPYC 系列企业级服务器 CPU 的需求，以及 Instinct MI450 系列 GPU 的发布。AMD Ryzen 移动芯片的销售带动了客户端业务的增长，该业务包括桌面端 Ryzen 处理器，营收为 29.5 亿美元，同比增长 7%。

Gaming revenue fell sharply for the company, posting a 40 percent drop in revenue at $773 million, which AMD attributes to “lower semi-custom and graphics revenue.” Operating margins in AMD’s data center business expanded from 25 percent to 34 percent, with operating income surging 168 percent to $2.88 billion.

该公司的游戏业务营收大幅下滑，下降 40% 至 7.73 亿美元，AMD 将此归因于“半定制和图形业务营收下降”。AMD 数据中心业务的营业利润率从 25% 扩大至 34%，营业收入激增 168%，达到 28.8 亿美元。

Embedded segment revenue, or all the SoCs, FPGAs, and boards under AMD’s umbrella that go into other hardware, was $1.1 billion, up 29 percent. AMD attributed this growth to gains made in the “aerospace and defense, automotive, communications, and industrial end markets.”

嵌入式部门（即 AMD 旗下用于其他硬件的所有 SoC、FPGA 和电路板）的营收为 11 亿美元，增长 29%。AMD 将此增长归因于在“航空航天与国防、汽车、通信和工业终端市场”取得的进展。

The gaming segment of AMD’s business is composed of two main sources. There are semi-custom processors that AMD supplies to other manufacturers’ consoles, as well as its own Radeon graphics business. Where things can get confusing is that Ryzen processors, like those commonly installed in gaming PCs, are counted under the company’s client business, not gaming. According to AMD Chair and CEO Lisa Su, “In Gaming, revenue declined 40% year over year to $773 million, primarily due to lower semi-custom sales as expected at this stage of the console cycle.”

AMD 的游戏业务由两个主要来源组成。一是 AMD 为其他制造商的游戏机提供的半定制处理器，二是其自有的 Radeon 图形业务。容易让人困惑的是，像游戏 PC 中常见的 Ryzen 处理器被计入公司的客户端业务，而非游戏业务。AMD 董事长兼首席执行官苏姿丰（Lisa Su）表示：“在游戏领域，营收同比下降 40% 至 7.73 亿美元，这主要是由于游戏机周期现阶段半定制销售额下降所致。”

Along with the Q3 financial results, AMD used the occasion to highlight hardware still in the hopper. The new AMD Threadripper Halo Station, which AMD first showed at IFA in September, pairs a Threadripper 9995WX CPU with up to four Instinct MI350P GPUs and can run trillion-parameter LLMs locally. The system is slated for a release sometime in 2027, with pricing still to be announced.

在公布第三季度财报的同时，AMD 还借此机会重点介绍了仍在筹备中的硬件。AMD 在 9 月份的 IFA 上首次展示了全新的 AMD Threadripper Halo Station，它将一颗 Threadripper 9995WX CPU 与最多四颗 Instinct MI350P GPU 配对，能够在本地运行万亿参数的大语言模型。该系统计划于 2027 年某个时间发布，价格尚未公布。

AMD also announced that Windows-based systems running on its Ryzen AI Halo platform will be “coming soon.” Known as Project Zenith, the effort will support a developer-focused Windows experience on the current PRO 400 Series platform. Built on the Ryzen AI Max+ PRO 495 processor, the chip supports up to 192GB of unified system memory, with up to 160GB of that available to be allocated for graphics, and is capable of running 300 billion-parameter models at 4-bit quantization.

AMD 还宣布，运行在其 Ryzen AI Halo 平台上的 Windows 系统将“即将推出”。这项被称为“Project Zenith”的计划将在当前的 PRO 400 系列平台上支持以开发者为中心的 Windows 体验。该芯片基于 Ryzen AI Max+ PRO 495 处理器构建，支持高达 192GB 的统一系统内存，其中高达 160GB 可分配给图形处理，并能够以 4 位量化运行 3000 亿参数的模型。

On the call, Su stated that AMD “started shipping MI455X in volume in the quarter, and lead customers, including Anthropic, Meta, Microsoft, OpenAI, and Oracle, brought their first Helios racks online quickly.”

在电话会议上，苏姿丰表示，AMD “在本季度开始批量出货 MI455X，包括 Anthropic、Meta、微软、OpenAI 和甲骨文在内的主要客户已迅速将其首批 Helios 机架上线。”