AMD throws its weight behind blockchain and cryptocurrency

AMD publishes its new guide to blockchain and crypto…

by Manoj Sharma for CNR

AMD, one of the leading manufacturers of graphics processing units (GPUs) of course, has launched an explainer page for both blockchain technology and cryptocurrency.

AMD’s products have been hit by the downturn in cryptocurrency mining this year. Not just because of the environmental concerns surrounding mining, and the drop in the value of cryptocurrency this year, but also the heavy competition it’s faced from Bitmain, a Bitcoin mining giant headquartered in China. Bitmain is said to own 51% of the world’s crypto mining power, and accusations over its market position have followed.

AMD, though, isn’t running away. In the explainer page, AMD has written many positive points about blockchain and suggests implementations in multiple areas such as insurance, digital advertising, medicine and healthcare, cybersecurity, and finance and banking.

The company says that “with the flexibility of blockchain, we are one step closer to a world of efficient data access and secure transactions, making intermediaries that inevitably introduce vulnerabilities and dependencies but are necessary in conventional transaction models obsolete… We are working with existing ecosystem partners to bring blockchain to compute solutions to market for a large variety of use cases and exploring opportunities with new and innovative platforms using blockchain”.

It’s inevitably a promotional page, but cryptocurrency gets a leg up as part of it too.

As per resources, it’s been published at a time when Bitmain has recently lost some hold in the market, and competitors are trying everything to get in on the action. This also explains the latest punch by AMD. However, even with Bitmain out of the way temporarily, AMD is still going to face heavy competition from technological bigwigs such as Samsung.

Recently, Samsung expressed interest in designing equipment for mining, which may make things difficult for AMD in the future.