According to Thurrott.com, AMD just announced blockbuster financial results for the quarter ending September 27. The chipmaker pulled in $9.2 billion in revenue, which represents a massive 36% jump compared to the same period last year. Even more impressive, net income surged 61% year-over-year to hit $1.2 billion. CEO Dr. Lisa Su credited the performance to “broad based demand for our high-performance EPYC and Ryzen processors and Instinct AI accelerators.” Despite these record numbers, investors weren’t completely satisfied – the stock actually dropped 3% in after-hours trading because the data center growth, while strong, didn’t meet sky-high expectations.
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The data center engine is roaring
Here’s the thing about AMD’s current strategy: they’re all-in on data center and AI, and it’s working. The Data Center business alone brought in $4 billion this quarter, up 22% year-over-year. That makes it their largest segment for three of the last four quarters. Dr. Su basically laid out this shift back in late 2024, saying they were going after Nvidia’s dominance in data center chips. And now we’re seeing the payoff with strong demand for their 5th Gen EPYC processors and MI350 Series GPUs.
But here’s where it gets interesting. Even with that impressive data center performance, investors were apparently expecting more. The stock dip tells you everything – when you’re playing in Nvidia’s backyard, “good” isn’t always good enough. The market wants to see AMD taking bigger bites out of the AI accelerator market, and while 22% growth is solid, it seems like Wall Street was hoping for explosive.
Don’t sleep on the other businesses
While everyone’s focused on data center and AI, AMD’s other segments are absolutely crushing it too. Client and Gaming together delivered another $4 billion in revenue – that’s up a staggering 73% year-over-year. The PC market, which everyone wrote off a couple years ago, is roaring back with record Ryzen processor sales driving $2.8 billion in Client revenue alone.
And get this – Gaming revenue exploded by 181% to $1.3 billion. That’s not just growth, that’s absolute domination. It makes you wonder – is AMD becoming the rare chip company that’s winning across every major category? The only soft spot was Embedded, which dipped 8% to $857 million, but when everything else is growing this fast, who’s complaining?
The AI arms race heats up
Looking at AMD’s official earnings release, Dr. Su talks about this being “a clear step up in our growth trajectory.” And she’s not wrong. The company is executing on its AI strategy while maintaining strength in traditional markets. But the real question is whether they can maintain this momentum against Nvidia’s continued dominance in AI chips.
Basically, AMD is proving they’re not a one-trick pony. They’re growing in data center, they’re dominating in gaming, and the PC business is stronger than ever. The challenge now is sustaining this across multiple fronts while continuing to close the gap in AI. If they can do that? We might be looking at the beginning of a genuine two-horse race in the high-performance computing space.
