Those who follow AMD-related news closely will be well aware that the company’s key CPU architect Jim Keller left AMD last month. At that time the company said that he had completed all of his work and that his departure from AMD wouldn’t affect what the company has planned for the future. There has been some speculation among the AMD faithful as to where Keller may land, if a rumor is to be believed, he might have been picked up by Samsung.
There’s speculation about his future because when he was leaving AMD Keller didn’t say why he was leaving a company he had been for such a long time, and he didn’t say where he would be going next. A rumor out of China claims that Keller may be going to Samsung, the Korean company is believed to have hired him to develop its next-generation mobile processors.
Keller is rumored to join Samsung’s R&D department in Austin, Texas. There he’s expected to play a pivotal role in enhancing Samsung’s Exynos mobile processors which have already had their outing on the company’s flagship smartphones this year.
AMD’s popular K7 and K8 processors were some of the projects that Keller worked on while he was at that company, it’s safe to say that he has the expertise that Samsung is looking for, and he will certainly be a valuable addition to Samsung’s team. Nothing has been confirmed at this stage though, there has been no comment from Samsung or Keller on this, so take the rumor with a grain of salt for now.