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AMD Closes OSRC, Lays Off Several Linux Kernel Developers

Posted by Unknown on from the reversal-of-fortunes dept.

From the H reporting on LinuxCon Europe comes news that several Linux kernel developers have been laid off by AMD as part of its workforce reduction. From the article: "OSRC staff primarily worked to develop the Linux support for AMD's server processors, but they also wrote code and extensions for related desktop and notebook CPUs – for example, they looked after the code to support CPU frequency scaling for the PowerNow and Turbo Core technologies. While working on the kernel's IOMMU and KVM support, one of AMD's former employees contributed to the development of the "IOMMU groups" feature that was integrated into Linux 3.6; this feature provides the basis for a new Linux 3.6 technology that allows a host's PCIe devices to be passed through to virtual machines and can also be used with Intel CPUs." Looks like the group was doing interesting research on hypervisors, lockless data structures, and multi-core synchronization primitives among other things. The Open Source Radeon driver developers are not affected by this at least.

7 of 94 comments (clear)

  1. I guess they don't want me to buy their products by h4rr4r · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The AMD/ATI linux drivers suck, they are laying off their kernel folks, and no indication they have any plans to change. I hope they survive, but convincing me not to buy your products is not going to help.

  2. Not sure I understand... by Nemyst · · Score: 5, Insightful

    The server market, usually Linux-based, appears to be AMD's most stable market. Opterons are very often preferred over Xeons for a variety of reasons. So why exactly would AMD start axing developers in areas related to that? If anything, it'd make more sense to throttle down consumer processors and focus on graphics and server processors, no?

    1. Re:Not sure I understand... by Rockoon · · Score: 4, Informative

      That is allegations floating around that the Intel compiler puts checks in the binaries that will only turn on MMX and other advanced bits when running on a Genuine Intel

      Its not just allegation...

      Due the the FTC ruling against Intel, its still not too late to get reimbursed by Intel if you purchased Intels compiler. Only a few more months left on that.

      --
      "His name was James Damore."
    2. Re:Not sure I understand... by Sponge+Bath · · Score: 4, Funny

      I know. First that Moses guy, and now this.

  3. Re:I guess they don't want me to buy their product by Grave · · Score: 5, Insightful

    AMD is betting the farm on ARM-64. If it fails to take off in the server world, there won't be anything left of the company. Too many cuts and too deep. The worst part of that is that not only would we lose competition in the x86 space, but graphics competition at the high end would also be gone (unless Intel starts working miracles).

  4. Re:I guess they don't want me to buy their product by Baloroth · · Score: 4, Informative

    This has nothing to do with graphics drivers at all, those were completely unaffected. It might impact implementation of some new server features on Linux, but it is strictly about CPU and related features, not APU or GPU stuff.

    --
    "None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license." --John Milton
  5. Re:As an AMD shareholder... by Kjella · · Score: 4, Informative

    You really should care more about their stock which is 25% of their high.

    I'm guessing you mean their 52-week high? They've had a stock price of over 40 both in 2000 and 2006, since Intel introduced their Core micro-architecture they've lost over 95% of their value.

    --
    Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings