Called the Shanghai Research and Development Centre, it is AMD's largest research centre outside the USA. AMD's statement was vague on other details, but called it a 'multi-million dollar facility.

The China-based centre will allow it to work more directly with customers that are based or manufacture locally, AMD says, including its OEM and Original Design Manufacturer (ODM) customers in the region including Lenovo, Hewlett-Packard, and IBM.

AMD rival, Intel, opened a similar R&D facility in Shanghai in April 2004, where it also operates a large chip manufacturing plant.