“Our mission was and is straightforward: to improve performance, reduce costs, and shorten time to market for our customers by providing building blocks of ever-increasing complexity to the manufacturers of systems for computation and communications.”
— AMD Founder Jerry Sanders

To help AMD customers stay ahead of the innovation curve, we launched our first memory product in 1975 — a RAM (random-access memory) chip known as the Am9102. That same year, we also developed a reverse-engineered version of the 8080A standard processor, which provided a competitive alternative to the market and brought AMD into the microprocessor arena.

Also in 1975, we introduced the very popular bit-slice processor series — the Am2900 family. This design allowed customers to take advantage of wider data paths, reduce heat, and use bipolar chip technology to increase speed. At the same time, it enabled software designers to create their own instruction sets for their applications, greatly enhancing design flexibility and providing an opportunity for companies to differentiate their products.

Throughout this period, we increased our ability to serve AMD customers worldwide with new construction in Sunnyvale, CA; Austin, TX; and Manila, Philippines — along with expansions at our factory in Penang. Despite the recession in 1974-75, our business grew to $168 million, representing an average annual compound growth rate of over 60 percent.