The big picture: Desktop CPUs are not shrugging off broader economic trends like inflation and declining product demand, according to a new research report. The tech industry’s second-quarter numbers were down across the board, but AMD somehow had a stellar quarter, gaining ground on arch-rival Intel.
Mercury Research reported (via Tom’s Hardware) last quarter’s desktop CPU shipments saw their biggest year-over-year decline since the group began keeping records in 1994. One researcher suspects this is the biggest drop since 1984. The report indicated that lower OEM inventories and lower demand were the main drivers.
As the pandemic economy appears to be coming to an end, the drop in demand is already showing up in bad press across the board. Intel lost $5 billion on a 22% year-over-year decline in revenue. Nvidia’s gaming revenue fell by a third. Phone shipments fell for the fourth straight quarter, Chromebook shipments fell 50% year over year, and tablet growth was flat. AMD was one of the only companies that did well.
Earlier this month, AMD reported a 70% year-over-year increase in revenue, briefly making it worth more than Intel. The Mercury report was also bullish on AMD, showing that its market share has grown compared to Intel in several areas.
AMD’s share of the desktop PC market increased 2.3% quarter over quarter and 3.5% year over year percentage. Mercury thinks AMD has managed to dodge the forces that hurt Intel here.
In notebook and mobile CPU shipments, lower demand led to year-over-year declines for AMD and Intel, but had a lesser impact on AMD. As a result, AMD’s market share grew 2.3% quarterly and 4.8% year over year compared to Intel.
Red Teams saw similar gains in server unit market share – 2.3% quarter-over-quarter – 4.4% sequentially and year-over-year – this is the largest increase since Mercury in 2017. AMD’s largest quarterly increase in servers since records began in the field.
A similar trend emerged in last month’s Steam Hardware Survey, where AMD’s CPU share rose 2.22% from the previous month.
Both Intel and AMD are planning to launch new desktop CPUs this year. AMD’s Ryzen 7000 series will be available next month, while Intel’s 13th-generation processors are likely to launch in October. AMD also plans to launch new Epyc server chips later this year, while Intel delayed its Sapphire Rapids server CPUs until 2023.
