nVidia Tesla champion heads for AMD (KitGuru)

[Skolomerija]

Interesting...


http://www.kitguru.net/components/graphic-cards/jules/nvidia-tesla-champion-heads-for-amd/

 

[Vesku]

AMD could certainly use the help making headway in the HPC market.

 

[VulgarDisplay]

Amd has been acquiring all sorts of talent lately.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Yes AMD has been making better moves than in the past lately, perhaps they moved out a lot of dead weight before and are now trying to acquire quality people to replace what they rid themselves of.


Don't they have the main GeForce and Tesla sales guys from Nvidia, or am I mistaken?

 

[blackened23]

While AMD has been getting the "right" people in the past year, so to speak....

I hope they speed the pace of software development, it is absolutely critical for the HPC segment. AMD has made a lot of progress in this area, but they're still not on par with NV. I would like for them to be on par with NV in the software area, it's the only thing holding them back IMHO. Their GPUs have always been competitive to some degree. When I look at NV it's easy to see why folks love them. Software makes hardware when it comes to GPUs. Again, AMD has taken steps but isn't quite there yet - certainly they're much better than they were a year or two ago, they just need to step it up a bit more to match NV in terms of software.

 

[3DVagabond]

While AMD has been getting the "right" people in the past year, so to speak....

I hope they speed the pace of software development, it is absolutely critical for the HPC segment. AMD has made a lot of progress in this area, but they're still not on par with NV. I would like for them to be on par with NV in the software area, it's the only thing holding them back IMHO. Their GPUs have always been competitive to some degree. When I look at NV it's easy to see why folks love them. Software makes hardware when it comes to GPUs. Again, AMD has taken steps but isn't quite there yet - certainly they're much better than they were a year or two ago, they just need to step it up a bit more to match NV in terms of software.

I read where you post this often. Do you have any particulars you feel they need to address?

 

[Vesku]

I don't think AMD has 300 software engineers working on their drivers and OpenCL, let alone a 300 man team focused on helping get those AMD Evolved titles coded: http://gearnuke.com/nvidia-announces-gameworks-program-montreal-2013-supports-steamos/

Imo, that's where some of any future profits should go. AMD has always needed better internal software design and support as well as external developer support.

 

[BallaTheFeared]

Are you saying AMD is doing it wrong, going after strong sales people instead of designers and programers which enable better software support thus adding value to the cards outside of just performance?

 

[Vesku]

A few sales guys, even at respectable salaries, are quite a bit cheaper than filling up a top tier software development team that is coding directly for specific, company, hardware.

 

[3DVagabond]

You need both. A good sales team is a very valuable asset.

 

[Vesku]

Yes, AMD must have increased their software staffing for the consoles. A moderate investment in top marketing and sales channel staff to help push the advantage of having won the consoles isn't a bad business move. However, imo, AMD doesn't have enough going on with the software side until we see AMD willing and able to give a serious push to OpenCL Physics, I'd assume in the form of Bullet Physics SDK, in their Gaming Evolved sponsored titles.

Seems Carmack is right to worry about fragmentation, though. Some of those Nvidia marketing employees will be believers in the walled garden strategy (PhysX, CUDA, etc.). If AMD hires or has hired some of those people into key roles there might be some rough waters ahead for PC gamers.

 

[beginner99]

A few sales guys, even at respectable salaries, are quite a bit cheaper than filling up a top tier software development team that is coding directly for specific, company, hardware.

Sales guys don't make better products. I hate talking to does guys because they usually have less clue about their products than my grandma.

 

[Teizo]

I don't think AMD has 300 software engineers working on their drivers and OpenCL, let alone a 300 man team focused on helping get those AMD Evolved titles coded: http://gearnuke.com/nvidia-announces-gameworks-program-montreal-2013-supports-steamos/

Imo, that's where some of any future profits should go. AMD has always needed better internal software design and support as well as external developer support.

You have to start with sales though. Yes, you need a quality product to sell, but without people who can effectively market your product...what you have TO sale won't make any difference.

 

[Teizo]

Sales guys don't make better products. I hate talking to does guys because they usually have less clue about their products than my grandma.

Tech people build, salesmen sale. You need both, but nothing happens until a sale is made.

I'm not talking about slick willies, however. Genuine sales people who know what the F they are talking about.

 

[Vesku]

In the hardware tech industry it's not so much slick selling as understanding the need to build and maintain good relations with your OEMs. Which should be a bit easier working for AMD's GPU division than it's CPU division, the last few generations of GPUs have been delivered to partners in a timely fashion.

 

[Edgy]

Yes.

Valuable Sales = turning vast client/buyer relationship into added revenue/profits.
These guys don't need much technical knowledge - that's what engineers and field engineers are for.

Marketing = these are the people who talk big and quite often have little tech clue. But believe it or not, they do bring value elsewhere.

 

[Teizo]

Thanks to the guy for PM'ng me about my late night typo. I'd hate to have such a blundering error go uncorrected...

I meant to write salesmen 'sell'

What can I say, we all screw up from time to time, but it is nice to have people looking out for you.