Jan 22, 2024 11:10:00

AMD removes 'Taiwan brand' from CPUs, clarifies that it is not a courtesy to the Chinese government

In the Taiwanese presidential election held on January 13, 2024, the conflict between the two countries became clearer, with

the election of Mr. Lai Kiyotoku, who declared an unyielding attitude to pressure from China, and AMD launched Ryzen 7000 , a desktop CPU. It has been reported that all markings stating that the chip is made in Taiwan have been removed from the series. AMD explains that the change is to conform to the new product notation and is not a consideration for China.

AMD removes Taiwan branding from CPUs, says change wasn't made to appease China | Tom's Hardware
https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/cpus/amd-removes-taiwan-branding-from-cpus-says-change-wasnt-made-to-appease-china

In a post on January 2, 2024, X (formerly Twitter) user MEGAsizeGPU pointed out that the RYZEN series chips no longer have the phrase 'Diffused in Taiwan.' In addition, 'Diffused in Taiwan' indicates that the chip was manufactured in Taiwan, and is distinguished from 'Made in Malaysia', which means that it was assembled in Malaysia.

The change caused a stir in China, with many saying it was 'another new company bowing to the Chinese government's demand that products made in Taiwan be labeled as 'Made in China.'' The news site Tom's Hardware reported.

There was also a theory that this change only applied to AMD CPUs shipped within China, and that other products would continue to have the 'Diffused in Taiwan' stamp on them. However, AMD denied this and revealed that it had done the same for all CPUs and that the reason was not political.

An AMD spokesperson told Tom's Hardware, ``AMD will remove country of diffusion from all new CPU and

APU products in 2023 to align with how we label our other products.'' He explained that the country of dissemination, that is, the country where the silicon die of the chip was manufactured, was no longer listed. All silicon dies for AMD's cutting-edge products are manufactured by TSMC, a major semiconductor contract manufacturing company in Taiwan.

This decision is part of AMD's efforts to integrate new products from Xilinx , an American semiconductor manufacturing company that AMD acquired for $35 billion (approximately 5,177 billion yen) in February 2022, with AMD's existing products. thing. Since Xilinx's products do not have the country of distribution notation, this change will unify the notation methods for the products of both companies.

Tom's Hardware points out that even Intel chips do not specify the country of manufacture, saying, ``It is common for CPUs not to display the country of manufacture, so removing it is certainly not strange. However, while AMD's new CPU notation may not ostensibly originate from a political issue, it does 'diffuse' a long-standing problem with the notation of products destined for China. There's no doubt about it.'

AMD has previously said, ``The reason the release of Radeon RX 7900 in China was delayed was because the country of manufacture was listed as Taiwan.'' Manufacturer Corsair was once forced to issue an official apology, saying it was a printing error, after abusing the Chinese public's sentiments by writing 'Made in Taiwan' on the package.