Intel hires a former AMD senior silicon architect to lead its discrete GPU development program.

Intel has hired Masooma Bhaiwala, a former AMD silicon design executive, to lead the chipmaker's discrete GPU efforts ahead of a planned 2020 product debut. Bhaiwala holds the title of vice president, discrete GPU SoCs, putting her in charge of discrete GPUs for client, data center and high-performance computing segments. She started in December and works within Intel's Graphics and Throughput Computing Hardware Engineering organization, which is part of the Intel Architecture, Graphics and Software group run by Raja Koduri, the former AMD chief GPU architect who was brought in to jumpstart Intel's discrete GPU initiatives.

Intel is planning to make a significant push into the discrete GPU space, targeting a wide range of segments from high-performance computing and deep learning to gaming and mobile. The chipmaker has previously announced plans to release its first discrete GPU in 2020 and has revealed details for a 7nm HPC and deep learning GPU code-named Ponte Vecchio. All of Intel's discrete GPU products will be based on the Xe architecture, which is designed to provide developers with a common framework. As Intel's Ari Rauch explained in November, under Xe there will be "many microarchitectures that enable peak efficient performance at each one of those workloads."

Bhaiwala brings extensive experience in silicon design, having spent more than 15 years at AMD before joining Intel. In a recent post, she reflected on her tenure, writing: "After 15+ amazing years at AMD, I have decided to take on a different opportunity... It was a truly fun ride, with an incredible team, during which we built some truly cool chips." Her LinkedIn profile indicates she has more than 27 years of experience in "building silicon design teams and delivering on-schedule, high quality parts." During her time at AMD, she worked on three semi-custom chips for game consoles as well as other semi-custom APUs and ASIC designs. Prior to joining AMD in 2004, she held positions as a senior RTL manager at Sun Microsystems and a senior verification engineer at Digital Equipment Corp.

Bhaiwala is the latest in a series of AMD executives to join Intel following Raja Koduri's recruitment in November 2017. This talent migration has included Mark Hirsch, Jim Keller, Balaji Kanigicherla, Kalyan Thumaty and Joseph Facca, reflecting Intel's broader strategy to acquire GPU expertise from its top rival in the CPU space.