Every December we see the same year-end wrap ups: the top ten lists, the trends to watch, the lists of things that we should be thankful for, the predictions for the next year.

I like to be different, so let me just declare 2010 “The Year of the AMD Opteron™ Processor.” Perhaps that is the power of having a blog – I can unilaterally declare things, and then, with the exception of user comments, stand alone to be judged on my accuracy by time.

In my opinion this one is the sure thing. So let me throw in my mixture of those lists I mentioned above to prove that 2010 will be our year.

The Top Ten: Instead of a top ten list, let me give you a top twelve list instead.  And let me make it really easy – every item is the same.  It’s a core.  Yes, 2010 will be the year of the core.  It looks like nobody will have more x86 cores in a single server processor than AMD, so if you are running highly threaded applications, we’re your best bet. When I think back to the B.O. times (before Opteron), the single core processor was the best you could hope for. We changed all that.

Now, as we look out into the first quarter of 2010 we’re scheduled to release 12 cores per socket with our “Magny-Cours” processors.  Customers running virtualization will love these processors.  Instead of the 8-10 virtual machines on a virtualized 2P server being set up as single core servers or having to share cores, they can now be set up as 2P virtual machines knowing that they will not be “sharing” their processor cycles with the other VMs. A big pool of resources helps ensure better load handling for multiple VMs on a single server.

Earlier this month I was at an IT conference and in the virtualization session, close to 75% of the customers confirmed that they were using virtualization somewhere in their environment.  Ok – it’s a small sample size and anecdotal – but still, talk about an industry prediction taking hold.

The Trend to Watch: Cloud Computing.  I just upped my hit rate on this blog by including the hottest buzzword in IT.  In 2008/2009 clouds were all the rage, but the recent economic events pushed people harder than ever towards evaluating cloud technologies.  I have met very few customers that aren’t in the investigation or evaluation stage right now.  This bodes well for our upcoming “Lisbon”  processors scheduled to launch in Q2. Designed for highly dense could environments, these new processors will feature a 35W power band.  With 6 cores at 35W, you are looking at less than 6W per core. When you consider that cloud environments will grow quickly and demand high density, as well as low power to remain affordable, these products are perfectly matched to cloud environments.

Things to be Thankful for: The Economy. No, seriously.  This past year has not been easy on companies, countries, or citizens..  But we have learned a lot from it. Unfortunately, in the past 18 months people bought fewer servers, all of the market data bears that out.  But in spending less on hardware, smart IT directors were able to save some of the headcount – and this is critical as businesses begin to see the light at the end of the tunnel.  In that IT conference I spoke to a lot of people who are starting to think more carefully about value in the data center.  Between getting smart about their purchases and taking a hard line look at value, more people are in a position to see beyond all the hype and take a look at what value they are truly getting out of their computing assets. And when it comes to value, we are the king. As budgets free up, people won’t forget the lessons that they learned in the downturn.  This plays to our strengths.

Another area to be thankful: Execution.  We have been exceeding customer expectations with our recent product introductions and I thankfully see no reason to believe that 2010 won’t see this trend continue.

So all that leaves are the predictions. If I could accurately predict the future, I wouldn’t be writing this blog, I’d be out on my bike in the mountains of Spain, wealthy, retired and happy.  Alas, as my stock portfolio can attest, I am not so visionary in some areas.  But I can safely  predict that a good chunk of 2010 will be spent in seat 21B (exit row, aisle) and that at least once I’ll get to have some stir fried duck hearts and livers at 1010 新湘菜 in Taipei (highly recommended).

And I feel confident in predicting that 2010 will indeed be the Year of the AMD Opteron Processor.

With more cores, more power efficiency and more value, I predict we’ll be delivering all the things that most customers are looking for in a server processor.  Our ability to succeed in 2010 will not be driven by a piece of silicon the size of a fingernail. Our success will be driven by our ability to accurately anticipate what our customers need and deliver that to the market. We saw the need to match our product lines with the market’s evolution into 2 main segments (highly scalable and highly efficient) to meet customers’ needs.  When you see the portfolio of products that we will have in the market in 2010, from sockets to cores to embedded technologies, there is hardly an area of the server market where we won’t have a strong offering, which is why 2010 has our name on it

John Fruehe is the Director of Product Marketing for Server/Workstation products at AMD. His postings are his own opinions and may not represent AMD’s positions, strategies or opinions. Links to third party sites are provided for convenience and unless explicitly stated, AMD is not responsible for the contents of such linked sites and no endorsement is implied.