Semiconductor and processor manufacturer company AMD is partnering up with Samsung to provide RDNA 2 graphics technology for an Exynos mobile system-on-chip, potentially giving a boost to GPU performance in flagship Samsung phones.
This announcement was made at Computex Taipei. There aren’t many details on the chip or which products it’ll be used in, but AMD has described the chip as a “next-generation Exynos SoC,” and has said that Samsung will provide further information later in 2021.
The GPU will use AMD’s RDNA 2 architecture, enabling features like ray tracing and variable rate shading. AMD says it’ll make its way to “flagship mobile devices.” Exynos is the brand name that Samsung uses for its own in-house processors. In the US and certain other markets, Samsung’s flagship Galaxy phones ship with Snapdragon SoCs from Qualcomm, while the rest of the world gets Exynos chips.
The Exynos models are generally regarded as slightly less performant than their Qualcomm equivalents, but it was seen as a surprise when Samsung decided to switch to the Snapdragon variant of the Galaxy S20 in its home market of South Korea.
During the show, AMD CEO Lisa Su said the next place you’ll find RDNA 2 will be the high-performance mobile phone market.
“AMD has partnered with industry leader Samsung for several years to accelerate graphics innovation in the mobile market, and we’re happy to announce that we’ll bring custom graphics IP to Samsung’s next flagship mobile SoC with ray tracing and variable rate shading capabilities. We’re really looking forward to Samsung providing more details later this year,” said Lisa Su.
