AMD’s CEO Hints at When Next-Generation Consoles Might Arrive
The PlayStation 4 and Xbox One are about to enter their seventh year in the market, there’s speculation over when the next-generation consoles will hit the market. With Sony having confirmed its intentions to continue the traditional console lifecyle, it’s only a matter of when.
There are several predictions over the release date with the gaming community even marking a Holiday 2019 possibility. But what better way to draw prediction than from the chip maker that powers the current-generation of consoles.
AMD recently posted its financial earnings for Q3 2018. During the earnings call Q/A session, AMD’s CEO, Dr. Lisa Su, responded to one of the questions which gives us a hint of when we can expect the next consoles from Sony and Microsoft.
Picking up on the question from Wells Fargo on what AMD expects from its semi-custom business as it enters 2019, Lisa Su responded by saying that it remains a key pillar of AMD’s portfolio. As the current consoles enter their seventh year in the market, AMD expects momentum to slow down, resulting in lesser revenue from its semi-custom business.
In 2019, we will be in the seventh year of the game consoles lifecycle and so we do expect it to be down.
But it’s a trend that Lisa Su says is “very consistent with previous generations”.
When we look forward, what happens beyond 2019, I like our semi-custom business, I think it’s a good business for us, I think it continues to be a place where we differentiate ourselves because of our ability to customize for various customers. I do see it growing again beyond 2019 and it will continue to be an important part of our business.
The information not only suggests that next-generation consoles won’t arrive until at least 2020, but also suggests AMD’s involvement.
AMD is in a unique position to provide semi-custom solutions for consoles. It has invested heavily in the business. And thanks to PlayStation 4 and Xbox One proving more successful than their predecessors, the semi-custom play has paid off. It’s logical to expect custom designs from AMD again if backwards compatibility is on the list of features for PlayStation 5 and the next Xbox.
The chip maker is on track to roll out the first graphics card based on TSMC’s 7nm process later this year, following with Ryzen in 2019. And with that information, expect next-generation consoles to debut with 7nm SoC.
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