AMD Expands Role For Global Channel Sales Head Amid AI PC Push

Neil Spicer is taking on the expanded channel and OEM role as AMD ramps up competition with Intel in the nascent but fast-growing category of AI PCs with its latest Ryzen AI processors, which, like Intel’s Core Ultra series, come with a CPU, GPU and neural processing unit.

The head of AMD’s global component channel sales is taking on an expanded role that will also have him in charge of the chipmaker’s relationships with PC vendors.

The Santa Clara, Calif.-based company told CRN last week that 14-year AMD veteran Neil Spicer took on the expanded role last month as corporate vice president of global OEM and channel for client and graphics.

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In turn, AMD has promoted 10-year company veteran Omar Fakhri to take over Spicer’s old title as corporate vice president of global component channel. Fakhri previously led AMD’s component sales for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

Spicer’s new role puts him in charge of driving sales growth of AMD’s Ryzen CPUs and Radeon GPUs with channel partners and OEMs. This makes him “instrumental in driving the strategic direction and growth for these key areas of AMD’s business,” according to Santa Clara, Calif.-based AMD.

The executive is taking on the expanded role as AMD ramps up competition with Intel in the nascent but fast-growing category of AI PCs with its latest Ryzen AI processors, which, like Intel’s Core Ultra series, come with a CPU, GPU and neural processing unit (NPU).

It’s part of a larger war between AMD, Intel and the dominant AI chip provider, Nvidia, as well as other companies in fueling AI workloads across the PC, data center and edge.

“I am thrilled at the opportunity ahead of me as the industry embarks on a new era of AI across all the AMD product lines,” Spicer said in a statement. “Our client and graphics products have been at the heart and soul of the 50+ years of AMD, built around an incredible product portfolio, brought to market by our world-class ecosystem partners and customers.”

While AMD beat Intel to the market last year with x86 CPUs for laptops and desktops containing an NPU for low-power AI workloads, the chip designer now has to contend with the immense resources its rival is bringing to bear to enable a broad ecosystem of partners, including ISVs and VARs, on its recently launched Core Ultra processors.

The company will also face competition later this year from Qualcomm, which plans to launch powerful Arm-based processors for AI PCs under the Snapdragon X name.

In an interview with CRN last December, AMD executive David McAfee said the company’s first-mover status for CPUs enabling Windows-based AI PCs along with its reliance on the x86 instruction set architecture for such chips will set it apart in the evolving landscape.

“So I think that AMD having both the scale as well as an architecture that is proven out with hundreds of millions of devices over decades and decades gives us a very unique position to lead from, and I think we absolutely intend to capitalize on that,” he said.